Fire Scars
by Morgan K'Treva
Summary: It's not that bad right? I mean I've only been claimed as property of the werewolves on the first day of school because of some supposed marking I have, and turned out to be a natural in . . . stuff that I'm pretty sure I didn't sign up for.
1. Chapter 1

I try to be as still as possible as Madame Pomphrey hustles the newcomer, an expert on burns who worked in a dragon reserve over. The man examines the burns, tutting slightly as he takes of the bandages. I flinch slightly as the bandages tear at the raw flesh, before sighing as something cool starts to cover them, slowly taking away the heat of the burn. As if from a distance, I can hear him say that the salve would need to be reapplied twice a day, and while it wouldn't heal the burns, it would protect them from getting infected. He says something about how some of the burns were third degree, and how I am lucky that the burns on my face are mostly second degree.

Then blessed darkness comes, letting me sleep for the first time in a week, when even dreamless sleep had failed to keep the dreams away.

* * *

><p>I come to to the feeling of pacing and a voice saying, " . . . he shoulds have listened to Dobby, yes he shoulds."<p>

I open my right eye, carefully keeping my left eye closed to keep from moving burned skin and I groan slightly as I see the blurry room beyond me. The muttering pauses before something scrambles frantically and the surviving half of my glasses are carefully slid onto my face, bringing a small elf into focus. "Is Mr. Harry Potter sir alright?"

"You're that elf . . . Dobby right?" I ask, blinking slowly. "Could I take you up on your offer now?"

There's a slight sob, and I watch as the elf frantically he buries his face on his pillow case before looking up with shining eyes.

"That was all Dobby has ever wanted," the elf says. "Now, does Mr. Harry Potter sir know where he wants to go?"

"Some where I can heal - and research schools," I say slowly, and Dobby nods. "And I need the recipe for the salve the dragon trainer's healer put on me."

"Yes Harry Potter sir," the elf says, looking thoughtful. "Dobby shall take you to the Americas then."

"You would know more than me," I say, letting my head fall back.

"Thank yous Mr. Harry Potter sir," the elf says, carefully taking the half of my glasses off.

* * *

><p>My dream that night is an odd one, with glimpses of hair in a shade of ruby, that even though it couldn't be natural, just seemed to be so, and flashes of amber skin as fingers gently traced the slight ridges and indents left my the burns with a coolness that seemed to gently cool the burning sensation. Almost at the edge of my hearing, a soothing melody was hummed by soft tenor.<p>

* * *

><p>When I wake up, it's to the sound of the ocean, and I slowly open my eye, unsure what to expect, and still wary of opening my left eye. Of course all I can see is a blurred mess, but before I can do anything, there's a pop and my half glasses are slid on, revealing two house elves, Dobby and another about the same size who is wearing a dress that is obviously hand made.<p>

"Mr. Harry Potter sir," the two chorus, Dobby bowing and the other curtsying. "This is Ada sir, and she be looking for a master."

The other elf steps forwards shyly and curtseys again. I look between the two of them again before I speak. "Wait, you want me to be her master?"

The two of them nod and I look at them a little fearfully. "I don't want to be a master."

"Not master then," Dobby says firmly. "Friend."

"Friend," Ada says, holding out her hand, and I hesitantly shake it.

"Friend."

* * *

><p>Ada stays and does all of the housework, as well as the spreading of my burn ointment, and some how gettting me information, since Dobby can only come occasionally due to his duties as one of the Malfoy's elves. As my skin starts to heal, I start exercising my body, careful not to tear the new skin, and falling into deep sleeps where I continue to have dreams of the ruby red hair and the amber skin, with fingers cooling the skin and numbing the pain, as the quiet song is hummed.<p>

As it turns out, Ada had been looking for a new master because her area of experience was healing, rather than one of the normal house elf professions of cooking, cleaning, accounting, gardening, be a personal servant, or head of the house elves. Her old master had kept her around for his children's childhood, but after he had sent his children off to school, he gently told her that he didn't need her anymore because the children were gone most of the year, and even then, he thought they were old enough to go to St. Mungo's now.

Then he'd gently handed her the small, nice dress that his children had made, and told her to go find herself a good master or mistress or friend who would keep her as long they lived. Ada, who had been crying, nodded, and after washing herself and putting the nice dress on, she had run to find Dobby, who had a reputation among the elves for finding good masters, mistresses, and friends. She'd waited patiently for Dobby until he had brought her to me.

When I ask her what she thinks of me she takes on a thoughtful look.

"Yous be a good friend. Ada feels good strong calluses, but like elves, so when yous can, yous will help Ada, or so Ada thinks," she proclaims before looking down shyly. I laugh and assure her that that is exactly what will happen.

And so, under Ada's loving care, the burns had heal much quicker than Madame Pomphrey had predicted. Ada tells me that that this is because "Madame specializes in magic, like most magic healers. Is why Magics do get scars, dey go to healers, not doctors." She'd sniffed. "Ada be healer and doctor, so Ada cures best."

Over the month I've been here, I researched schools around the world, looking for one that suited me, and while I found many that I like better that Hogwarts (Most of the schools out of Europe, except for the Greek and Italy schools, contacted magicals at five and had a day school system where they learned both muggle and Magical subjects, before having the choice to continue day schooling or to be sent off to boarding school at eleven, where they continued that education), most of them just didn't fit me. The only one I found that did, was more magic based than the others, and was more of a system of three schools, whit mounting levels of Darwinism, that were collectively called Benal Schools.

Ada had looked at the pamphlet for a short moment before nodding. "Is good. Is near."

* * *

><p>So after that I'd started looking up ways to disguise myself permanently. Most of the books I looked at were useless in that aspect because many governments had forbidden it because of how criminals would use it, but there was one really old book that was very useful, in addition to telling me something particular.<p>

Transfiguration and curses are permanent, creating a permanent change in the rune matrix they are cast upon, charms and jinxes only last as long as their rune matrix has power, and potions, while they can be permanent, are usually made just to last a certain length of time.

That was the information summed up by the introduction, and then the rest was kind of like a computer in the way it was arranged. If you were just casually reading it, you could just read through, and it was arranged into Transfiguration, Charms, Permanent Potions, and Timed potions. Within each section, it was arranged by hair, hair length, eyes, skin color, scars, face shape, body shape, and gender.

If you were looking to get a specific result, you could tap the front page of the information section with your result in mind, and the next page would show the potions way and the charms or transfiguration way. You could also look at a list of possible changes in each section. When Ada had found me looking at the scars section she had sat next to me and read through the section on third degree scars with me. When we were done, she had hmmed and assessed me with sharp eyes.

"Harry Friend want to do?" she had asked, eyes sharp, and I hesitate.

"Would you be able to keep the scaring from restricting my movements or vision if I don't?" I ask finally, and Ada nods.

"Then no, I don't want to do it," I say firmly.

"Sure?"

"Yeah," I say. "Now why don't you help me, I'm trying decide what I'll look like after this."

Ada sat next to me, her eyes scanning the lists of possible changes (I'd asked for all of them.) before she quickly tapped a couple of them and the page dissolved, melting so that hair color was on top with tabs sticking out labeled with each of the things Ada had tapped. She'd scanned the list and nodded before turning back to me. "Harry Friend try temporary first, and see how you like. Show Ada when done, yes?"

"May I stand?" I ask, and watch as she stares at me for a moment before speaking.

"Only to get Ada. No helping."

She then turned and walked away, leaving me to the book. I look the book over, and take the shortest version of the charms (lasting six hours) and go over them once in my head, using the trick that Ada had taught me when I'd had trouble with a spell and thinking about what was going to happen. Not necessarily _why_, because this is _magic_, but what.

The hair spell comes first, building extensions of magic on the end of mt hair and stopping when they get to my waist, the rest of the magic temporarily making my natural hair as straight as the charmed hair was, and set the dispelling words to "Ruby-hair". Next I charmed my hair color to a extremely light, almost white blonde hair, and set the dispelling words to "Boy-who-would-not-bloody-die", and my skin to a dark tan color that I remember from pictures of Asian Indians in some history book, and set the dispelling words to "Ada-the-awesome-elf". My eyes were changed to a more Asian shape, and turned a dark amber, with the dispelling words "Dobby-elf-rescuer".

When I was done, I carefully get off the bed and stand, using the carved staff that Ada had gotten me to balance as I carefully walk to the door, catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror on it's back before I open it. Ada finds me a couple steps from my room, and when I stop and let her look over me, she nods approvingly before helping me hobble back to my room and pulling a chair out for me to sit on so that I can looking my mirror.

I look into the mirror and into the eyes of a stranger, who has burn scars, and though I don't really recognize myself, it feels kind of good. No offense to Ron, and Hermione, but most of what I associated with my old looks were bad memories, first because of the Dursleys, then because of my fame, and the backlash of being a person in the open that had come just hours before I was burnt. The absolute contrast between short, dark hair, pale skin, and dark green eyes and the pale hair, dark skin and white scar, and soft, but sharp amber eyes made it hard to imagine that the person in the mirror was the same as the one beneath the charms.

Ada had grinned at me as she saw my small smile.

"Now yous just needs a new name, and better sight," she told me softly as she brushed a strand of my currently white hair from my face. I smile at her in the mirror.

"Well, you're the one with the power of books," I tell her with a smile. "Get me what ever you think is best, and I'll try it. Getting this permanent can wait until the charms wear off."

She simply nodded and disappeared with a pop, appearing a few moments later with a big pile of books. She set them down before snapping, making the books sort them selves into two piles, one much larger that the other. "Here yous be. Have fun!"

* * *

><p><em>So, hello! Welcome to my story, hope you like it!<em>


	2. Chapter 2

Once Ada had helped me find a potion to fix my eyes and after I'd Changed myself permanently into the boy in the mirror and gotten a new wand (Ebony, 12 inches, Theseral mane core), Ada sat me down and started giving me lessons on how to act like an aristocrat in the magic and non-magic world, for Europe, Africa, South America, and Japan.

Apparently, in Europe, it's required for the aristocrats to learn Oculomeny, the art of guarding your mind if you want to be told anything important, and pretty much everywhere else it's almost required to lean your animagus forms. Other than that and various holidays, the manners between the magic and non-magic are basically the same, and all of them required being polite and respectful.

She also helped me find my first animagus form, which had turned out to be some animal I'd never heard of before; a kelpie.

When I asked her why she knew this and why she wanted me to learn it, she'd sniffed and said that she was the elf that had been assigned to a noble's children, and thus had to watch their lessons. "You need to be unidentifiable, yes?"

When she was done, five months had passed, and I'm pretty sure none of my friends would recognize me, because part of Ada's training had been turning my accent into something that made every word I spoke sound kind of like I was singing. My writing with quill, brushes, pens, and pencils was now looking a lot like calligraphy. She had also trained me to respond to a name the two of us had picked out; Noah Ezekiel Reis.

All during this time I had been receiving letters from Hermione and Ron, then just Ron, who had told me that Hermione had been petrified. Ada had stopped me from rushing to Hogwarts by telling me that she would brew the Mandrake potion and deliver it herself, but I couldn't go because then I would have to stay for another year.

The next letter after that was from Hermione and Ron again, and she told me that she had figured out that the creature petrifying things had to be a basilisk, and that it was getting around in the pipes, but no one but Ron had believed her.

Now, I look up from the rune and warding homework to find an owl pecking at the window, and I hurriedly let it in. It drops the letter on the desk and leaves with a ruffling of feathers. I open the letter, reading it with excitement, my face paling as I turn and run to the door.

"Ada! I have to go!"

* * *

><p><em>Harry, Ginny and Hermione have been kidnapped by the heir of Slytherin! He said he was going to kill them. Hermione left me a trail leading to Myrtal's bathroom.<em>

* * *

><p>"Got your wand?"<p>

"Yes."

"Potions?"

"Yes."

"Sword?"

"Yes."

"Gun?"

"Yes."

"Broom?"

"Yes."

"Sun-glasses?"

"No."

"Then take these."

"Ada, what- wait, is this a family line trace?"

"Yes, I just changed your parents and grand-parents. It's still incomplete though."

"So-"

"Yes."

* * *

><p><em>'Open'<em>, I hiss at the sink that Myrtal had indicated, and it slides open, revealing a giant sink hole. I turn, and let the manners that Ada had ground into me come to the surface. "Thank you Myrtal!"

"You're welcome, No'ah!" Myrtal said with a giggle, drifting out of the window to smile at me. "If you die down there, you can always come and share my bathroom!"

Outwardly I just smile, but inside I'm grimacing as I send about twenty-five different cleaning charms down the slime infested tunnel, doing each charm four times before I bring out the broom Ada had gotten me and start flying down the tunnels, a lumps lit on the end of my new wand as I stay as far away from the wall as I can while still flying down the pipe. At the bottom, I see the literal sea of animal skeletons, and I take a moment to lovingly pat my broom before I fly on, seeing the massive snake skins, and keeping a keen eye out for movement.

Most of the movement comes from me moving with my light, and I frown, noting in my mind to ask Ada for a magic light that I can project.

After like fifteen minutes of flying over the snake skins and skeletons, I pause as I see a fleck of red in front of me, and hear banging emanating from around the same place. I pause for a moment before I lean forward on my broom and hurry as fast as I can, pulling up in time to not crash into the wall.

"Ronald?" I ask the redhead in front of me as the banging stops.

"Who are you?" he asks suspiciously, squinting up against the light of my lumos.

"I'm Harry's friend. Harry couldn't come because he's in bed with a fever. He's been with me since Christmas," I tell Ron as I slowly float down and land next to him, dismounting my broom.

"Oh yeah?" Ron says. "Prove it."

"You were knocked out in a game of chess on your way to get Nikolas Flames's stone," I say. Ron studies me for another moment before he sighs.

"I'm sorry. It's just been hard around here without Harry. The Slytherins keep taunting us, Hermione and I, and saying that he ran away," Ron says with another sigh, leaning against the metal door behind him. "How much do you know about us?"

"I feel like I know you already, since Harry talked about you two so much," I say as I look at the door. "Were you trying to open that?"

"Yeah," Ron grunts. "It was opened recently according to this spell Hermione taught me."

"Well you won't be able to get in. It'll only open for a parcelmouth, unlike the entrance, which will open for anyone who can imitate the way open sounds," I tell him as I run my hand over the snakes.

"How do you know?" Ron asked curiously, and looks a little guilty when I look at him with surprise. "After Harry left, Hermione managed to get me to study, and I was curious about wards and lock because of my brother Bill, who works as a curse breaker. I found it really interesting."

"I can tell," I say, rolling my eyes.

"Any ways right here and here," I tap two sets of runes on either side of the door," are one of the really uncommon wards. Anyone who can speak an animal language will always have a extra part on their magic matrix, and while human vocal cords can imitate some sounds, the languages that communicate with animals are only there because of those extra parts, and these wards were set to only let people who have a parseltounge matrix part open the door. The first one you came across was only sound based."

"That's awesome," Ron murmured as his eyes traced the runes around the door. "What are the rest for?"

"They're basic wards for privacy, and tell the snakes that lock it how to pull back," I say, my eyes tracing them before I turn to Ron. "I'm guessing that the Chamber of Secrets used to be a refuge for the students in case a muggle born brought witch hunters to Hogwarts. It would require you to know how to hiss open, meaning you had to have heard parseltounge, which explains why the entrance was sound based. It also had a deadly monster to protect them once they were in. So, you ready?"

"For what?" Ron asks.

"To go in," I say, drawing my wand and putting my broom into my fanny pack.

"I thought you said only parselmouths could go in," Ron says, bewildered.

"I'm a parselmouth," I tell him.

"What?" he asks, drawing away.

"It's not like it's a bad ability you know," I tell him. "In the Americas, it's popular because of the Mayan's Quetzalcoatl. They also used it to ward off poisonous snakes. It also is one of the easier languages to attach to your matrix."

Then I turn back to the door before pausing. "How's you get in here anyways?"

"Mione."

I think about that for a moment before I shrug and turn to the doors. _'Open.'_

The snakes slide in a fancy pattern, making me roll my eyes. Ron, though cautious of me now, steps in next to me, his wand held up. The two of us advance down the long, dimly lit chamber in between the serpentine columns. At the last of the columns I have to tilt my head back to look up into the face of a giant granite statue dressed in wizards robes with hair and a beard that touch the floor. Ron cries out next to me and starts running toward the two crumpled forms.

"Hermione," he asks frantically, shaking first her shoulder, than Ginny's. "Ginny? Wake up!"

"They won't wake up," a calm, cultured voice says, and my eyes flicker to the source as a tall, dark boy emerges from the shadows of the pillar closest to the two girls, his edges unsubstantial in a way that reminds me of ghosts.

"What?" Ron asks, tearing his gaze away from his sister.

"They won't wake up," the boy said, twirling what I recognized as Hermione's wand.

"Isn't it rude to not introduce yourself?" I ask from my position at the entrance.

"You're the ones who came to my home," the boy replied calmly.

"Quite," I say. "You see, the thing is that it's not your home. I'm Noah Reis."

"Quite the claim," the boy said, walking towards me. "I'm Tom Riddle."

"Pleasure," I say, dipping my head the slightest bit, keeping my eyes trained on him. "And by what right do you claim this sanctuary?"

Behind Riddle, Ron was gaping at me as Riddle hissed at me. _'I am a parseltounge. That should be enough.'_

_'You are not the true lord of the Ancient House of Slytherin,'_ I reply back calmly, drawing on the aristocrat mask Ada had pounded into me. _'And just so you know, it's impossible to lie in parseltounge. And besides that, I know many parselmouths who were most certainly not descended from Slytherin.'_

"What?" Riddle asks, his voice dark and furious, and I laugh at him.

"Try it some time!" I tell him, and he hisses incomprehensible words at me. Then he turns and raises his arms, walking towards the giant statue at the end of the room.

_'Speak to me, Slytherin, Greatest of the Hogwarts Four,'_ he hisses, and mouth of the far above statue opens. I break into a sprint the moment his back is turned, and crouch down next to Ron.

"What were you talking about?" Rom asks.

"He claimed this was his because he's a parselmouth, and I simply told him that I know many parselmouths who don't descend from Slytherin," I tell him before I pick up Hermione. " Come on, Riddle is Summoning some creature, and I don't want them to get hurt."

Ron nods and grabs Ginny, a black book dropping out of her robes. I pause to grab it, my eyes narrowing at the feel of the magic with in it weeping. Then, between the two of us we manage to hide them behind the closest pillar.

Then, before he can protest, I stun Ron and set him down between the girls. When Riddle turns back around as a slithering sound echoed from the face-statue, I'm the only person standing.

'_So hungry,'_ the basilisk hisses. _'Kill.'_

_Well, there went my miniscule chance at getting it to go somewhere else or protect us_, I think, pulling on the sunglasses that Ada had forced into my hand with my family line trace. I run back to the pillar on the side of the room and start climbing. The the top, I crouch and wait.

"Scared Reis?" Riddle asks, just like Malfoy.

"You wish!" I call back, before freezing as the familiar melody from my dreams haunts the edges of my hearing, steadily growing louder. Below me, Riddle was looking down the empty chamber. The music quickly reaches a high pitch that sets my bones buzzing, and flames erupt at the top of the pillar across from me, and fading to reveal the orange-red-gold bird that is grasping something in it's talons.

. . .

"Fawkes," I breath.

. . .

The phoenix trills, diving off the pillar and flying over to me, circling a few times before he settles on my shoulder and rubs his head on my cheek.

"That's a phoenix," says Riddle as he stares at him before his gaze drops to the bundle in my lap. "Though what that is . . ."

Then Riddle laughs. "So what have you done to get Dumbledore's trust? Abuse some children?"

"No. As a mater of fact, I hate him," I reply calmly as I slide the burlap packaging off the long thing with in, dropping a sheathed sword and a sheathed, matched pair of daggers into my lap. I'd become quite disillusioned from Dumbledore after being burned. "I've almost died three times because of him, and probably more because I was too young to remember."

"Then why are you saving his lackeys?" Riddle asks, the curiosity in his voice reminding me of Hermione.

. . .

"Because," I look up from the weapons.

. . .

"They're only here because of Bumbledore anyways," I say, strapping the weapons on, the silvery daggers on either side of my waist and the odd sword on my back. "So when is your creature coming out?"

There's a slithering sound, and Riddle examines his nails unconcerned as he walks over to the pillar across from mine and leans on it, examining his nails. "Why? Want to die soon?"

I roll my eyes. "Riddle, stop, you sound like my immature rival. I'd think you'd be more sophisticated considering how much effort you put into your voice."

"Well it's not like I'm going to let you leave," Riddle replies, and the basilisk slithers into sight. "Goodbye. _'Kill him'_."

The basilisk hisses and throws himself at the pillar I'm on as Fawkes takes flight, and I leap to the next pillar over.

_'Fun,'_ I hiss, because I know it will bother Riddle, and because this is my first time being able to test how I can really move now. I jump to the next pillar again, and turn to face the basilisk.

_Now I have to survive this._

* * *

><p><em>Welcome back! Hope you like it! And about the sunglasses: <em>

_Even regular glasses should help because they would mean that you are looking through something at the basilisk. I mean, Justin Finch-Fletchley was looking at the basilisk through a ghost and he was only petrified, that's why I think that wearing glasses would help, especially sunglasses. The basilisk (lets call her Lis) certainly seemed to leave all of the other petrified kids alone after they were petrified, and I figure that one you're petrified, you can't exactly see so he gaze wouldn't harm you anymore. If Lis had direct orders to kill, then why didn't she ever kill any of the muggle borns after they were petrified then?_

_I think that Lis probably considers animals that are petrified as good as dead because one they're petrified they won't be moving so no vibrations or movement telling the snake it's alive, and they'll stop giving off heat as far as I can tell; fooling Lis's heat senses, and it does take a special potion to bring the petrified person back. There for, as far as Lis is concerned, those who are petrified are dead. I'm not saying that the glasses would stop Harry from being petrified, just that they give him a better chance of surviving. We know that Lis was blinded, but he doesn't, and if he glances into Lis's eyes before she is blinded, he dies. Now, I'm not going to be killing him since he's my main character, but he doesn't know that, and thus he's taking precautions. _


	3. Chapter 3

I run, trying to get as far away from the poison green basilisk as I can while keeping it away from the others. The sunglasses luckily stay secure on my head but I still don't dare to look back. I manage to climb another pillar in thirty seconds, a wait breathlessly for the basilisk to crash into it, but it's not long before the parseltounge equivalent of screaming fills my ears and I wince.

Another scream comes moments later, and I can't stop myself from looking, my eyes first catching the basilisk's scales before I trail it's torso to it's head. It turns with a snap before I can shut my eyes, and I wince, blinking as I realize after a moment that I can still see, and I open my eyes cautiously. I stare into it's eyes now, looking at the remains of what had been large yellow eyes that are now mostly torn out and dripping blood down the snake's head.

I cry out as the basilisk snaps at Fawkes, the phoenix disappearing for a moment before he flashes next to me in a burst of fire.

_"LEAVE THE BIRD! KILL THE BOY!"_

The basilisk turns his head towards me and lunges, sending Fawkes and I scrambling apart (though for Fawkes it was more of a graceful hop), and I bump into a pillar just as the basilisk's head hits the ground. I draw the sword and hold it as Ada had taught me. The basilisk lifts it's head and turns slightly, huge bloody eye sockets, mouth gaping open with fangs as long as the sword as it lunges-

I yell as the force of it's lunge sends it crashing down onto the sword I'm holding up, and I barely manage to keep the sword up, falling to my knees and letting go at the end as the sword twists to the side with the weight of the basilisk's head. There's a cracking sound as I do, and I blink down at my arm, to see a yellow-white fang buried in my left arm. I take a deep breath and yank the fang out. In all honesty, despite the decidedly white hot pain, it's not as bad as being burned was because this pain is more centered. I breathe and and let myself lean back, my hand covering the hole the fangs had made as I close my eyes, remembering the book I had read about basilisks once Hermione had said she thought the creature was a basilisk.

. . .

There is no cure for the poison of a basilisk.

. . .

There's a sudden weight on my lap, and then talon are gently clenching at sweat pants I'm wearing. I open my eyes and look down, the world only a blur of color, to see a haze of red on my lap.

"Fawkes-" my voice breaks, and I feel the phoenix's sharp beak nudging gently at the hand covering the hole where the fang had been. I let him move it, the hand sliding down my arm. He lays his head onto the spot a moment later, and I can't help but wince. Footsteps echo as I close my eyes and left my head go back to the wall again.

"You're as good as dead now Reis," Riddle's voice cove as echoing foot steps move closer. "Even that ridiculous bird of Dumbledore's agrees. Do you know what you did Reis? You made a phoenix cry!"

My arm is starting to feel hot now, but I ignore it, just breathing deeply.

"I think I'll sit here and watch you. Take your time, I'm in no hurry."

Riddle's voice sounds sharper now, and the pain almost feels like it's seeping away into the heat of my arm. Suddenly Fawkes flaps his wings and his talons grasp at my shirt, and he rubs his head on my face. I close my mouth and swallow convulsively when something salty gets in, and the pain that had been creeping towards my heart is washed up with the rest of my body in a sudden outburst of heat before it abruptly cools, feeling strangely like it had in my dream.

"What are you- Get away bird!" Riddle says abruptly. I open my eyes to see him standing over me, waving his arm at Fawkes, who had his wings spread over me. Fawkes meets my eyes for a moment before he flags his wigs and flies away from me.

"Phoenix tears," Riddle says quietly, staring down at my arm. "Of course . . . healing powers . . . I forgot."

I look down, my hair, trapped between the wall and my back, puling at the movement, and stare at the perfectly round scar on my arm.

"There is no cure for the poison of a basilisk," I hear myself say distantly.

Riddle scoffs. "Then what just happened?"

"I don't know," I say numbly.

"Doesn't matter," Riddle says briskly, and I look up to see him pointing Hermione's wand at me. Before he can do anything though, there's a rustle of wings and Fawkes drops a battered book, the one that had fallen out of Ginny's robes earlier, onto my lap, Fr a split second the two of us are staring at it before Riddle starts forward reaching for it-

And I act without thinking, grabbing the fang beside me and plunging it into the diary. Riddle screams, falling to the floor and writhing. The diary spits out ink all over my robes and my hands like I'd just opened a hose, before stopping abruptly, the same time a Riddle disappears.

I stare numbly at the ink-soaked diary and the Hermione's wand lying in front of me. There's a sort of deafening silence until Fawkes's wings cut through it as he flies to me, and he settles on my lap, butting at the hand holding the diary as he croons. I blink down at him for a moment before I take a shaky breath and, grasping Fawkes carefully, I stand, letting the diary fall to the ground. Fawkes nuzzles my cheek, pushing the sunglasses off of , perfectly comfortable under my arm. I walk to the basilisk's head and pull the sword out, wiping it carefully on my shirt before sheathing it on my back.

There comes a moan from the other side of the chamber after I grab Hermione's wand and the diary, and I turn to look at the spot where I'd put the other three. Ginny sits up as I walk shakily to her, and she looks at me with wide frightened eyes. Tears pour down her face as she scrambles backwards, making me pause.

Fawkes lets out a chirp after a moment, drawing her eyes to him until I cough.

"I'm not going to hurt you," I say gently, my voice barely s whisper, and when I move this time, she doesn't scramble away, but she does watch me warily as I walk to Hermione and Ron. I set down Fawkes and Hermione's wand before offering her the fang-pierced diary, and she cringes away from it, her eyes wide.

"It's alright," I say, turning it to show her the hole through the journal. "Tom Riddle is gone now. The basilisk is as well."

I set the diary down so that she can grab it if she wishes, and Fawkes chirps again as he hops over to her, butting at her chin.

Then I turn to Ron and Hermione and pull out my wand, casting a silent Renervate on them, and they both gasp and fly upright.

"You stunned me!" Ron accuses when he sees me, while Hermione just looks around wildly. "And where'd you get the bird and the sword?"

"I did," I say. "And I'd do it again. The lady said that the creature was a basilisk, and if I had to worry about you getting in the way as well as the basilisk, I might have lost. The bird is Fawkes, a phoenix, he came to me with the sword and knives."

"Who are you?" asks Hermione, finally looking at me. "And where is that boy?"

"I'm Noah Reis, a friend of Harry's," I say as Ron fumes. "And if you mean Riddle, then he's gone. I stabbed his diary with the basilisk's fang."

Hermione scrutinizes me before turning towards Ginny, who is still staring at the diary and gently puling her towards her body and hugging her. Ron after an awkward moment joins them as Fawkes hops back to me. I pull him back into my arms and stroke him gently, ignoring Ginny's sobs and her telling what had happened to her.

A minute or so later, they're helping her stand, and they turn to me as I let Fawkes hop off my lap and I stand.

"Come on," Rom says after a moment, gently leading Ginny and Hermione back the way we had come in, Fawkes flying above us and leading the way, occasionally bursting into an encouraging song if anyone seemed to need it. In the gloom, his feathers are glowing a soft golden color. Eventually we reach the pipe that leads to Myrtle's bathroom, and Fawkes lands, chirping encouragingly at the three in front of me. They stop at the base of the pipe and look up it.

"Did you think about how we're supposed to get back up this Ron?" Hermione asks, her voice oddly subdued.

"Erm, no," Ron admits, just as subdued, and I step forward.

"I have a broom," I say, making them turn towards me. "I could take one of you up at a time."

"Alright," Ron says after a moment, gently pushing Ginny towards me. "Take her first."

I pull the broom out of my fanny pack and mount it, holding out a hand to Ginny. She takes it, and I held her climb on in front of me before wrapping one arm around her and use the other hang onto the broom. I kick off gently and carefully take us up the pipe. I'm surprised when, after a couple of moments, Ginny relaxes into me. It doesn't take long though before I'm landing on the wet floor of the bathroom, and Myrtle drifts down from the window to examine Ginny delighting in her hair, and generally distracting her from the situation. I send her a grateful smile and she winks at me. It doesn't take long for me to get Hermione and Ron up as well, Fawkes flying with me as I take Ron. When all of us are up, the sink covering the pipe to the Camber moves back into place, and Myrtle bids Ginny goodbye.

"Where to now?" Ron asks after Myrtle drifts off to her toilet giggling.

"Let's follow Fawkes," I say, pointing to the phoenix, who was standing at the door and waiting for us. Hermione nods, and after helping Ginny down from the sink she had sat upon, we all follow Fawkes's hopping steps as he leads us to Professor McGonagall's office. Ron knocks and pushes the door open and I stand awkwardly behind the rest of the group.

For a moment, there's silence as the four of us stand in the door way covered in muck, slime, blood and ink before there's a scream, and Mrs. and Mr. Weasley are flinging themselves at Ron and Ginny.

Not far behind them are two people I recognize as Hermione's parents, who converge upon Hermione with hugs and tears. I watch them for a moment before I look past them to where Dumbledore is standing at the mantelpiece with Professor McGonagall. Fawkes flaps his wings and rises to settle on my shoulder.

"What happened?" Mrs. Weasley finally asks, pulling back from Ginny a bit so that she can look at me suspiciously.

"I think we'd all like to know that," Professor McGonagall states weakly, and I look at her in concern. I hesitate for a moment before pulling Riddle's book out and silently placing it on the desk.

Then Ron starts talking, staring all the way back at when I heard the disembodies voice, and ending when I stunned him. At this point the attention turns back to me.

"You claim to be Mr. Potter's friend, and you must have some proof or Mr. Weasley wouldn't believe you, but why did Mr. Potter go to you, Mr. Reis?" Dumbledore asks. I shrug.

"He asked a house elf to bring him somewhere safe, and I guess the thought my house was good enough," I reply, and Dumbledore's face takes on a thoughtful cast, but Professor McGonagall asks me to continue.

"He taunted me, called the basilisk, Fawkes came to me, I killed the basilisk, Fawkes gave me Riddle's book, and I figured that stabbing it on the fang of the deadliest snake in the world should do some damage," I say. "It worked, and then Mrs. Weasley over here woke."

I look around at every one before shrugging. "I must go now though, people will worry."

Fawkes chirps sadly, but hops off and onto the desk. With that, I turn and quickly walk away. I turn the corner, only to run into someone. I blink, shifting back to look up into the face of Lucius Malfoy, with Dobby hovering around his ankles, a stained rag in his hands as he takes the opportunity to try to finish polishing Malfoy's shoes.

"Ah! Mr. Malfoy, a pleasure to meet you, " I say, bowing quickly in the pure blood way, my palms together in front of my chest. His face tightens before he bows in turn.

"I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage, who might you be?" he asks, standing straight and appraising me.

"Ferris Selwin," I lie smoothly. "I was just about to come to you, my sister wanted me to deliver something."

I twist my hand behind my back, hoping desperately for my wandless magic to work for once and I almost sigh in relief as I present Malfoy with a horribly embroidered set of small pants. His face is a blank mask as he takes them and folds them, before putting his arm under his cloak, almost like he means to tuck then into a pocket, but I see Dobby holding them with a look of awe a moment later.

"That was all sir," I say bowing again before I hurry on, hiding my grin.

* * *

><p><em>Sorry for the wait!<em>


	4. Chapter 4

When I get home, Ada is all over me, snapping me into the shorts she always uses when ever she gives me a checkup, and I lay there and let her do her examination, and let her move me like a rag doll after, putting my feel on a pillow and covering me with a blanket as ten words repeat in my head.

. . .

There is no cure for the poison of a basilisk.

. . .

I don't know when, but I eventually slip into a nightmare, the basilisk chasing me and biting me without Fawkes being there or the words from the book repeating over and over as Fawkes cries onto the wound, his tears doing nothing or the basilisk's venom lurking in my body and waiting until I'm happiest to strike or-

A song suddenly enters my dream, singing of peace and calming me down, pulling me away from the basilisk. My attention is drawn down to where fingers are stroking my arm, fitting in perfectly between the burns as bright red hair brushes them. I can feel the person's - a boy about my age from what I can tell - humming from behind me as he strokes my burns, his right arm holding me against his chest in the suddenly much cleaner and brighter Chamber. I know now, from my months of experience that if I try to see his face, the dream will end abruptly, leaving me feeling like I was doused in cold water, so I simply let myself relax into the embrace. My right arm comes up to rest upon his and his humming lulls me to sleep.

When I wake, it isn't abrupt, but a simple and slow realization from one second to the next in the drowsy warmth, that I am no longer asleep. My eyes open, and I stare at my arm, thinking. Ada had grown back all of the muscles and skin that had been burned away, and had I not asked her not to, she would have eventually healed the scars and made the areas affected by the burn look like nothing had happened. As it is, the burns had healed into silver-white scars that in no way affected my movement.

I sigh after a moment and slide my legs off the bed to sit up. Ada pops in, and I let her fuss around and make sure every thing's alright before getting up, dressed and sitting down to the breakfast Ada had made ("Blueberry pancakes and bacon!" she exclaimed cheerfully, sitting down across from me to her own breakfast. If I didn't know better I would have though that she was a cooking elf, not a healing one.).

When we're both done, Ada reading her issue of National Geographic as I drink the last of the milk in my cup, I speak.

"Ada, the basilisk bit me."

There's silence for a moment before Ada looks up, her face pale, eyes wide and frightened.

"No," she whispers, but i'm already shaking my had as I pull up my left sleeve to show her the circular scar again, and she flies around the table to look at it, placing her hands on it for a moment before clicking frantically, books appearing around her and he clicks again, all of the books falling open. She frantically reads one after another, her movements becoming more and more frenzied until she reaches the book I had read about basilisks, and I can tell when she finds the sentence that had been repeating in my head.

. . .

There is no cure for the poison of a basilisk.

. . .

"No!" she says again, wailing this time, sobbing as she throws herself at me. I hold her tight as I lean down to pick up the book and look at the description of the poison, and I blink before I gently push Ada back.

"Ada, I don't think I'm going to die though," I say, turning the book and setting it on my lap, using a hand to make sure she doesn't fall off. "Look, it says that the poison is supposed to work in five to fifteen minutes. I would be long dead by now if I was going to die."

Ada blinks and wipes her tears away with with a handkerchief I'd given her, her eyes scanning the numbers once, then twice, then a third time before they link to my words, and suddenly Ada throws herself at me again, crying as I gently rub her back.

There's a crack, and she immediately turns, leaping off my lap and into a position to defend me, making a surprised Dobby blink at us.

"Ada? Miste- Harry, sir? Did something happen?" Dobby asks, looking between to two of us. Ada leaps back up onto my lap after a moment to hug me again.

"Yous shall explain. Is punishment for upsetting Ada," she mumbles into my shirt, and so I roll up my sleeve to show Dobby the circular scar and I explain what had happened when I told Ada that I had been bitten.

"I showed her this," I end, gesturing to the book on my lap. "I told her that if I wasn't already dead, then I'm probably not going to die of the poison."

Dobby nods, looking thoughtful.

"Can you think of anything - anything -that coulds have done that?" he asks after a minute as I hug the shaking Ada.

"Well," I say, thinking back, "Riddle - the person controlling the basilisk seemed to think that the phoenix that helped me used his tears to neutralize the poison."

Dobby nods, looking thoughtful. Suddenly he looks sternly up at me.

"Harry sir! Yous were supposed to be resting and healing safely, not getting into danger!" he scolds.

"Sorry," I reply as Ada pulls back. "But my friend and my other friend's sister could have died!"

"Yes, Harry sir," Dobby replies, looking tired before he brightens. "Oh! Harry sir! Thank yous for freeing me!"

"Yous freed Dobby?" Ada asks from my lap, and I nod as Dobby bounces, excitedly launching into a heroic (and over exaggerated) version of how I freed him from the Malfoys.

". . . but the pants is all gone," Dobby finishes, looking downcast at these last words.

"Now that I can use my wand, I can make you some more," I say. "It's transfiguration, so they'll stay that way unlike the thing I made yesterday. Or I could sew them. And you can make your own clothes now too."

Dobby's eyes widen again before he smiles almost shyly. "I woulds very much like clothes from you Harry sir."

I turn to Ada, and she speaks, "I would like this too, Rafiki."

(Rafiki was the compromise Ada and I had finally agreed on, it means friend in Swahili, but it's sounds like a nickname or something.)

"Alright," I say after a moment and the two elves in front of me cheer. "But, do you think you could find me a sword instructor or something? I have the sword and the two daggers I got from Fawkes."

Ada looks thoughtful and she exchanges glances with Dobby before nodding. "I wills, Rafiki."

* * *

><p>It doesn't take me that long to make Dobby and Ada new clothes, the longest part being the discussion of style and cloth to be used. Dobby wanted all bright colors, and Ada insisted on all dark colors, and the two kept trying to force their colors onto the other. I got them to compromise after a day by telling them to bring me what ever cloth they wanted, and I would make two out fits, one for each of them. That got them to stop, and the next day ten bolts of fabric appeared along with a sewing machine, thread, needles, books on how to sew, and several patterns. The fabric shades went like this: eye-watering rainbow tie-dye, deep red, neon green, emerald green, electric blue, navy blue, canary yellow, deep gold, bright pink, and royal purple.<p>

When I'd gotten around to asking Dobby if he wanted to stay with me, he grinned and nodded enthusiastically.

I cut out the patterns that had been pinned to the different bolts of fabric and with a little measuring, cut out the fabric itself. The books on sewing that had been put on the table are very helpful, and it doesn't take long before I get the hang of the sewing machine. After a week, I'm feeling better than ever, and I've finished the clothes. Some of them don't really look right, but I suspect that Ada and Dobby will like them anyways.

I nervously call both of them into my room after dinner after a week, and point them to the stacks of folded clothing.

"Well?" I ask nervously as Ada lifts the dress on top of the pile up, the royal purple one I had made that hugged her torso to her waist then flared out, with sleeves that should go just past her elbow and a few shiny beads I had asked Dobby to get. Dobby's is a tee-shirt and shorts set made from the rain-bow tie-dye. They both jump at me, babbling and crying as they hug me, and I smile, gently hugging them back. After a minute, they draw back, eyeing each other before they race to their piles of clothing and start looking through them, exclaiming at the clothing, and snapping their fingers to put an outfit on and racing to the mirror to look at them selves. I smile as I watch them exclaim over their clothing, delighted in what I had done. Ada had even tried on the dresses in bright colors, and was twirling in front of me like a model on a runway.

"Thank you Rafiki!" Ada exclaims again after showing off her last dress, the tie-dye fabric, which I had made into a sundress.

"You're welcome Ada," I reply happily.

"Oh," Ada says suddenly. "We found yous a weapons instructor Rafiki!"

"Yes," Dobby says, hopping up next to Ada. "But we needs your help to get him, his last master solds him off recently so he contacted me. Since he was solds, he needs to be bought."

"Alright," I reply. "See what you can do. Try to get him for the lowest price. Also, measure him, I want to make clothes for him too."

"Yes Rafiki!" Dobby cheerfully exclaims. He turn and snaps once, making all of his clothes disappear before snapping again a disappearing. I gather up Ada's clothes, preform a the charm she had taught me to shrink myself into a house elf and turn to look at her.

"Come on, Ada, let me help you get your clothes to your room," I say cheerfully. She shakes her head at me, but I can see her smile as she leads me out of my room and through a small door in the wall next to mine into hers. I help her hang the dresses in her closet and when we're down, we both go to sit on her bed. It feels weird, being smaller then Ada, but it doesn't really matter as she smiles at me and starts telling me stories that the house elves have, as different from those of the wizards as the wizard's stories are from the muggles.

" . . . and I accept your offer of marriage," Ada concluded, finishing the tale of Hawly and Jenin.

"Huh," I mumble, almost asleep, and I blink up at Ada, catching her smile.

"Come on Rafiki," she says, gently pulling my to my feet and pushing me out her door and into my room again. She helps me up onto my bed and under the covers just as the charm making me into a house elf runs out of magic, making me shoot back to my normal size. She gently walks to the door and turns off the lights

"Good night Ada," I call sleepily as she closes the door, making her pause.

"Good night, Rafiki," she replied, shutting the door and leaving me in darkness.

* * *

><p><em>Alright people, here's a new chapter, hope you like it! Not much action (or really any at all), so, very fillery. Anyways, I have a new story up, where's I've got the story Ada was telling Harry, it's called <em>Tales of Mipsy the Traveler_. It's nothing really important, and not that well written or thought over, not eve sure what it's moral is supposed to be, but it's there if you want to read it._


	5. Chapter 5

Thorin is the name of the elf that Ada and Dobby bring to me. He was formerly and elf employed by the Magical Law Enforcement Department of Britain. He, like Ada had, bowed to me and treated me with much respect - at least when we weren't training. His training was relentless, and he made me stand and move long after my muscles turned into liquids. The first thing he had told me when he started training me was that he would not go easy on me because that was the quickest path to getting me killed. Even so, when we were outside the room that Thorin had said was to be used solely for training, his personality flipped completly and he became painfully shy, and it took two of the three summer months before he would come into the same room as me.

Unlike Dobby and Ada, though, Thorin was skilled in two things; teaching self defense and cooking.

This made a big difference because while Ada could cook very well, her cooking was bent more towards getting the proper nutrition into me than tasting good. Thorin on the other hand knew how to cook everything just right, and because he knew self defense, he knew how to properly get me the right nutrient - ones that would help me more than Ada's experience with food would because he had to know how to keep a person's body in top shape instead of just average. In the month before he was able to speak with me outside of the training room, he made me memorize which foods I needed to eat in order to keep in top condition.

Ada drilled me in manners even harsher, going through the species other than wizards this time, getting me into my animagus form (Being a Kelpie, a creature that naturally has two forms surprised me at first, especially when I discoverd that it meant I had a second human form.), and sending me out into the world to practice my manners and earn favors with people near the school. The three of the elves collaborated to make an obstacle course, and to prepare me for being attacked at any time. By the time school was to start, I could wake up in an instant to retaliate with or without magic and had a sixth sense for immediate danger, as well as the looks and manners of a culturally ambiguous noble. The scar that had made me an idol to the European Wizarding World, which was now cover by burn scars, had been exorcised by a Japanese Onmyoji after Ada decided that I was fit enough to run a spiritual diagnosis on.

Now, I smile at me three elves as they proudly stare back at me, tears running down their faces. Ada coughs before speaking through her tears.

"Wand?"

I twist my hand and let the ebony wood slide into my palm from the depths of the dimensional pocket Ada had taught me to make as a part of Egyptian manners, called the Duat.

"Ring?"

The wand returns to the Duat as it falls and the thin focus/power storage ring of simple titanium flashes from it's place on me finger as I present my hand to Ada.

"Assorted other foci?"

A heavy bag drops into my arms and I open it to let Ada see the incense and other items.

"The Hogwarts founder's weapons?"

I drop the bag back into the Duart and draw back the notice me not enchantment on the three weapons.

"Clothes?"

The notice me not falls back over the weapons as a duffle bag falls into my arms, and I let Ada see the contents.

"Potions?"

Drop, grab, show.

"Broom?"

Drop, grab, show.

"Food?"

Drop, grab, show.

"That's everything then," Ada says, wiping her nose discretely on her sleeve.

"I'll see you all for Halloween," I tell her as I drop the food bag back into the Duat and kneel down to hug the elves that were now the only ones that I consider family. Dobby sniffs loudly, Ada following his example, and Thorion clinging to me silently before I draw back gently. "I'll be fine. This is what you've been training me for right?"

"Yes," Thorin answers me softly, Dobby and Ada too worked up to speak.

"See you!" I promise them once more before I turn and with a click I my heels find myself blinking up at the modest wooden cabin with the bright sign proclaiming it as Saraswati's Hostel, that was the last information the book had been able to provide about Benal, other than that the three schools were some where in the Sierra Nevada. I take a deep breath to settle my nerves before I briskly pull the door open and enter the building.

"Noah! Come here!" the man at the counter calls out cheerfully as he hands a croissant to a customer and waves me over. He's one of the people I had met during my Ada-inspired wanderings of the surrounding area, and we had become friends as I continued to return to his cafe for his marvelous tea and pastries. He's already pulling one of the buns out of the display and buttering it just the way I like as I slip under the counter and sit on the stool next to him.

"How've you been since I last saw you?" I ask in amusement. "Any wood sprites managed to nick a cooling pie lately?"

"Not since you helped me with those wards," Mason laughed as he placed the bun in front of me and sweeps brown hair out of his bright blue eyes briefly. "They've been happier than ever though, with the leftovers all left for them and kept warm. They've even started leaving me herbs and wild berries!"

I smile at his enthusiasm as he describes the incredible quality of the food that the fairies had left him, how the regulars had been commenting on the taste of the food for the last week and what he's been putting the food into. I occasionally chime in to add in another use or a way I would have used something.

It isn't until I'm picking the last crumbs of the bun off the plate that something happens. The door opens to admit someone, and I turn to look at them as I always do, but before I can analyse much more about the boy other than that he look Asian, he gasps.

This is enough to make me wary after the year and a half of it in Britain, and I stare back at him, ready for fight of flight. Someone else pushes him, breaking our eye contact, and apparently his shock, because he finally strides over to the counter. The group of laughing girls behind him follow, but I keep my eyes of him still as he orders a tea cup. With a little prompting, I put the cup together as Mason takes the girl's order and bustles around behind the pastry display. I thread my magic through the ring on my right ring finger as I send letters scrawling across the napkin I wrap around his cup before I hand it to him. He takes the cup and goes to sit in the corner of the room, nursing his cup and not looking down at his napkin.

By the time Mason has finished with the girls, I'm annoyed enough at this to be able to look away, and start talking with Mason again, this time about hair-styles and the trouble it takes to style long hair. While not entirely ignoring the boy's presence, it still surprises me when a perfectly thrown paper plane lands in my lap. I excuse myself for a moment as another customer comes in to look at the boy's reply.

_Why did a werewolf trust you enough to warn others away from you?_

I blink at the sentence scrawled across the paper before looking up to meet the boy's amber eyes. Then I sigh and slip out from under the counter and walk to the boy's table.

"What do you mean by this?" I ask, setting the paper down in front of the boy.

"I mean what I said. Some werewolf liked you or something so much that they marked you as their child, with both of their forms I might add," he replies, narrowing his eyes. "That shouldn't have happened in their human form, let alone their wolf form. What happened?"

"I haven't seen a werewolf other than you as far back as I can remember," I reply snappily, and his gaze shades, the honey color darkening noticeably.

"That . . . can't be right," he mutters to himself, and I sigh as I let my fingers splay across the table and cast a notice me not across our table and conversation. His eyes flick to the side as the magic passes him to include him in it's bubble before his stare returns to me and he leans forward to blatantly sniff at me. The frown on his face grows with each sniff, and after a minute he pulls out a clam shell mirror and held it to his ear like a phone.

"Thomas, I need you to come to Saraswati's Hostel. Yes, I know you weren't planning to come, but it's important. No I can't just tell you, you wouldn't believe me. Yes, I'm in the corner lie always. Yeah. Bye."

He ends the call and looks solemnly at me.

"Let me introduce me self and see if I can explain this," he finally sighed. "I'm Ezekiel Darby."

"Noah Reis," I reply, presenting my right palm. He gives tired smile at that, but waves it off.

"What do you know about werewolves?"

"I know the customs and rituals between them and wizards from all over, but not all that much abut their pack life," I answer. "There wasn't enough time to teach me that."

He frowns a bit at that, obviously wondering what I mean, because I look like a noble, and usually nobles have their whole lives to learn these facts, before he dismisses it and leans forward, his sharp amber eyes focused on me.

"Well, the first thing you should know then is that werewolves, like regular wolves are very much pack animals. Though we spend most of our time in human shape, were are still werewolves all that while, so this still affects us, and because of that, there are even fewer wolves that don't find a pack of other werewolves by their first year."

"What does this have to do with me?" I ask.

"I'm giving you some background," Ezekiel explains, pushing a hand through his short hair before smoothing it forward. "The only reason I can think of for you being marked by a werewolf is if they never found a pack, and so instead formed one with a group of humans. It wouldn't sooth the wolf like a pack of werewolves would, but it would help greatly - especially if they found a way to be with the were wolf during full moons to wear it out."

"So one of my parents knew a werewolf and was friends with it?" I ask, a frown spreading across my face.

"Yes," Ezekiel replies, taking a sip of tea.

"There's a problem with that," I say slowly. "My parents died when I was one, and I'm absolutely sure that I haven't met any of their friends since because the relatives I was sent to hated them."

Ezekiel loses the last of the calm demeanor he had been holding on to by the skin of his teeth ever since he saw me, and his face goes pale.

"You haven't seen any of your parent's friends since you were one?" he asks weakly, his hand shaping so badly that he has to set down his teacup.

"Is that bad?" I ask, watching as he mutters to himself.

"Bad?" he asked, sounding like he was only just stopping himself from having a nervous breakdown. "I was assuming that you'd seen the werewolf in the last day!"

* * *

><p><em>Alright, here's the next chapter, hope you like it! We're finally starting to get to the main story line now!<em>


	6. Chapter 6

Before Ezekiel can say anything else though, an African-American woman walks into the Hostel and rings the bell by the door.

"Anyone who is here for Benal, please come with me," she said, and immediately a rush of people under twenty two converged into the area in front of the doors, Ezekiel and I included, and we follow her as she leads us around to the unused outdoor seating area. I sit down, and Ezekiel follows me, two girls and a boy sitting with us after a glance at Ezekiel, and then we all watch the woman.

When all of the people were seated and silent, the woman started talking again. "If you are here, that means you think that you an make it at Benal."

She paused to look over us. "Some of you will fail."

Some of the people around me shuffles at that, but we all remained silent as the woman looked over us.

"If you are here for Raven, come with me," the woman said, and a bunch of kids under ten shuffled up to her. "As for the rest of you, the owner of this establishment has enough tokens for all of you. You are to take a token and use it to find you way to school. You have five days. No flying above the trees. No groups larger than five."

With that, the women knelt, and started talking to the kids gathered at her feet, and passing out leather bracelets to them. Ezekiel exchanges a look with the other people at the table, and they nodded at him and left.

"What's so bad about me not having seen the werewolf?" I ask Ezekiel as soon as the seating area had cleared out.

"The mark he put on you is strong, stronger than it has any right to be after - how old are you?"

"Thirteen."

"After twelve years. I can't imagine how strong a mark would have to be to last twelve years and still convey that level of protection," Ezekiel ranted, pulling his hair out of his ponytail as he winds his fingers into it. There's a small pop, and a scowling boy pulls out a chair next to Ezekiel, absently running a hand through his brown hair as he scowls at the Asian boy next to him.

"What's so important that you called me here?" asked the boy grumpily.

Ezekiel waves a hand at me, still muttering incoherently, and the boy turns to look at me, extending a hand after an awkward moment.

"Thomas Rodgers," he introduced as I shook his hand.

"Noah Reis," I reply as the boys amber eyes focus on me and he tilts his head before glancing at Ezekiel again.

"So, he's been marked, it's happened before," Thomas asked n irritation.i

"Ask when," Ezekiel said, finally falling silent as he watches Thomas, who turns to me.

"From what he said, twelve years ago," I shrug, and Thomas stares at me.

"What. The. Hgggugh," he growled, not even questioning me as he turned back to Ezekiel. "Why didn't you call the adults?"

"Because when I called you I just though it was a wolf who hadn't found any others, not a freaking natural Alpha who hadn't found any others," Ezekiel grimaced, and I frown at them.

"You think a natural Alpha claimed me as it's child?" I ask. "But doesn't your council find all of the natural Alphas, and set them up with packs?"

"Not always," Thomas said darkly. "Where are you from?"

"England," I state, and hold my hands up at their frowns. "I got chased out for being a natural Parseltounge."

"Why does the world hate me?" Thomas asked, closing his eyes and breathing deeply, before turning to Ezekiel. "Looks like I'm coming with you. I am not getting dragged into that mess."

* * *

><p>They called the adults, and then we went in to get out tokens from Mason, who wished me good luck, and told me to remember to come back during the school year.<p>

I'd wondered how the tokens were supposed to help, but once they were off the pole Mason had put them on, it was obvious. The piece of rock tugged slightly, and when Thomas noticed me looking at it as we followed it's tugging, he explained about it, looking less irritated than he had been earlier.

"They're actually tokens, as in made in a way called token magic," he explained, holding his up in front of himself. "These have been around since the Benal siblings made the school. They're meant to lead you first to the connection point, where we can get to the land the founders duplicated and lead us to the school afterwards. Even people who've been to the school before need one while they're testing you because the change the landscape and where the connection point is during the five days they test you."

"Thanks," I say, looking closer at the rock and the chain it's on, and Thomas offers a small smile.

"You're welcome," he said gruffly, letting the rock fall to his chest as he followed Ezekiel.

We're currently climbing through a forest, pine needles crunching beneath our feet.

"Do you know why the founders choose here to make their school here, in the Americas?" I ask after a few minutes.

"Well, it was a chance not to be constrained, and it allowed the Natives to learn more," Thomas explained. "It was also part of the school's moto, "We were sleeping dragons.". Because of the level of their magics, most of the Europeans considered the Americas harmless, the Benal siblings wanted to arm them, to give them a chance. It didn't work as well as they hoped because of the attitude that Natives with magic held towards their magic, but it did help some. I think they choose California specifically because of the Sequoias, and how large they grew. The school is mostly inside of living Sequoias."

* * *

><p>We kept on climbing the mountain, Thomas answering my questions as we went, and getting less gruff. It wasn't until an hour had passed since we left Saraswati's Hostel that we encountered a problem. Ezekiel stops, and Thomas cuts off his explanation about who the woman that had come to pick us up was.<p>

Thomas's eyes suddenly seems to glow as he looks at whatever is in front of us, a growl coming from low in his throat as a giggle started. "Teihiihan."

"Amarok," the creature before them replies, and I try to move forward, but Thomas stops me.

"Don't," he says simply. Then the two leap forward with a snarl, and the fight in done in a minute. They leave behind a dark skinned body the size of a child.

"What was that?" I ask quietly as the two wash the blood off a stream that we had been walking by.

"Teihiihan, cannibal dwarves," Thomas says shortly. "They're quicker than humans, and don't wait for spells. They also really don't like werewolves."

"Oh," I say, pulling a towel from the Duat.

"Why did he call you Amarok?" I ask, handing him the towel, and he grunts his thanks.

"Amagok. Means Grey Wolf in Inuit mythology. Can also mean any type of wolf."

He tosses the towel to Ezekiel, who quickly uses it, then tosses it back to me.

"We need to move faster," Ezekiel says as I put the towel back into the Duat.

"Fine," Thomas mutters. "Come on, Reis. Let's go."

I follow them as they keep climbing through the forest, the rock on its chain tugging me. After about an hour, we come to a clearing in the forest and find ourselves in front of a wall. Thomas looked at it and sighed.

"Can't we go around it?" I ask, but Ezekiel shakes his head.

"No, we can't go around anything we come across, now come on," he sighed, and walked towards the brick wall, Thomas following. They looked at the wall for a moment before Thomas sighed and knelt, putting his hands out for Ezekiel to step on. With the boost, Ezekiel was able to grab the top of the wall and pull himself up so he was straddling it. From the top of the wall he called, "You next!"

I look at Thomas, who nods, before I carefully step on his hands. I wobble, but Ezekiel grabs my hands before I have to step down, and between the other two boys I safely straddle the wall. I look down the other side, and stare at the rocks surrounded by hot coals before Ezekiel coughs to bring my attention back to him. Thomas is holding his hands out, and Ezekiel is holding one. I copy him after a moment, and between us we manage to get him up.

"Why is it always stepping stones?" Thomas asks in exasperation as we look down the wall.

"I'll bet it's because you hate them so much," Ezekiel snorts. "One of the teachers probably heard you complain, and set this up just for you!"

"Haha," Thomas says flatly, before jumping down to the first stone. Ezekiel copies him after he jumps to the next one, and after a moment of watching them nonchalantly jump from stone to stone I jump down and cautiously copy them. We land safely at the end and look at the next set of obstacles, chest high walls placed between high walls of water with hungry looking piranhas swimming through that hovered over a space about the same height as the walls. "Vaults and Hurtles."

"Yeah, yeah, you think you're so funny," Ezekiel grumbles before he placed his hands on the wall and hauled himself over it, Thomas and I quickly copying, and ducking under the piranha water tanks cautiously. This doesn't take as long, but by the end, I'm panting, and the two werewolves are breathing heavily. We just keep going, and crawl through the dark tunnel in front of us. Ezekiel mumbles about halfway thought, "This is just a glorified obstacle course."

"I know," Thomas mutters from in front of me. "Better this than fighting though."

"Mph," Ezekiel grunts. After the tunnel comes a series of thin corridors that we move through sideways, back and fourth. Then comes a diagonal rope that we climb up across a pit of snakes ("Oh, come on. It's too cold for Rattlesnakes here!") and down. Then we leap over a couple of ditches full of a mysterious yellow gas that hisses ("Please don't be mustard gas."). After that we climbed some slopes and jumped down only climb another slope a couple of times before we got to the balance beam, which stood over what looked to be a lion's dens. Then we had to vault through several sets of windows, climb up and down a ladder, and climb a couple more slopes and jump from the tops. By the time we're back in the forest, it's starting to get dark.

I watch Ezekiel and Thomas argue under their breath at each other about setting up a camp. By the time they've finished, it's fully dark out, and I've already started a fire. Thomas turns in triumph, only for the both of them to stop and blink at me in confusion.

"When did you do that?" Ezekiel asks in confusion, looking at the fire, and the beans off to the side with steam coming off. I swallow the mouthful of beans that I have before I reply.

"You two argued for about an hour. I got bored and started the fire after fifteen minutes, and the beans about fifteen minutes later."

"How did we not notice this?" Thomas asks flatly as I swallow another mouthful of beans.

"You two looked pretty involved. I thought you were going to kiss at some points," I say, and the two of the very carefully look away from each other, making me laugh. "So are we going to stay here?"

"Yes," says Ezezkiel flatly, flashing a glare at Thomas who ignores him in favor of poking through his bag, and pulling out a long bag. "We should be safe enough so long a we remain in Thomas's tent."

Thomas, after setting his long bag down and tapping a charm attached to the top to make it expand into a tent, makes a show of opening it and showing the roomy interior, a fact that makes me blink for a moment before shrugging it off.

"I'm ready to sleep," I say after finishing off the last of my beans. "So where should I go?"

"Here," Thomas calls from within the tent. "I enter, and after a glance around walk over to Thomas who is holding a door open for me. I glance around at the fiery reds all over before I turn.

"Thanks," I say to Thomas, who is still at the door. "For coming with and for answering my questions."

"You're welcome," he replies calmly. "Can we have the rest of the beans?"

"Sure," I smile, and close the door. I lean back against it for a moment and just think about a day before I sigh and slip into a fresh pair of clothes pulled out of the Duat, and put my now dirty clothes into it. I turn off the light, climb into my lent bed, and quickly fall asleep.

* * *

><p><em>Here we go, on our way to school. Hope you like it!<em>


	7. Chapter 7

It takes us another two days to arrive at the connection point, which Thomas and Ezekiel say is actually making pretty good time, fighting a dragon, kelpie, Sphinx, two more Teihiihan, an emela-ntouka, a kishi, and a baku, not in that order. At some point, a bird that Thomas labels as a Fenghuang at a glance comes towards us, and we duck, but it does nothing more than bursh through my hair with the tips of it's talons as it swoops down before flying off. We stumble through the connection point after the dragon with our clothes smoking and slightly charred, and are met with a valley full of trees as tall as the mountains around them. We stumble to a stop, and just stare at the valley for a moment, breathing in the crisp air.

Then something makes a move beside us, and our wands swing towards the animal, my attention split between the animal - what looks like a large black dog, and Thomas. When he relaxed after seeing the dogs, I allow myself to as well, and look down at the blackened bits of the clothes I had chosen today, cleaning and drying them in a single movement as Ezekiel grins and moves towards the dogs, Thomas at his side. I look up when they start making little barks and whines, but after the past three days, and my parceltounge, that ability is nothing. I look up when they swing themselves onto two of the dogs and break away from the mostly sleeping pack with a third riding behind them.

"Grab the collar and use it to brace yourself," Thomas says from his dog, scratching between the ears of the dog he's riding. "They're hellhounds, a misleading name, entirely because of their size and coloring. They're actually big softies that don't have any objections against different races. Yours is a female named Gaea."

"Thanks," I say pulling myself onto the hellhound and carefully petting it between the ears. There's a sort of vibration, and I glance back to see Gaea's tail wagging, and I laugh slightly, the hesitation I had from my memories of Dudley's Aunt Marge and her bull dog set behind me. "And thank you, Gaea."

Gaea let out a woof, and Ezekiel laughs. "She says to have fun."

"Why did I just get a feeling of impending doom?" I ask, but Thomas and Ezekiel just laugh. "Thomas!"

I yelp as suddenly Gaea and the other two hellhounds plunge over the cliff, leaping from inch wide ledge to inch wide ledge. It only takes me a moment though to adjust, my hands tight around the collar and my legs gripping Gaea's sides as she leaps in a way that reminds me of my broom in a storm. I start to laugh, easily following Gaea's movements, Ezekiel and Thomas laughing behind me. It takes us five minutes to reach the ground, and by the time we do, my hair is in even more of a disarray than it had been the past two nights, the braid falling apart because the rubber band had lost so much of the hair.

"Did I mention that they're daredevils?" Thomas asks, sounding a bit breathless as he and Ezekiel climb off of the hellhounds who had taken them down, giving them friendly scratches on top of their heads. They get a gently woof and head but before they amble over to the group of hellhounds sleeping in the sun.

"Ha ha," I mutter, throwing my leg over and sliding off of Gaea. I scratch between her ears with a gentle smile. "Thank you."

Gaea buts my wrist and gives me a tongue lolling smile before running off to join the pack. I watch her for a moment before turning to Ezekiel and Thomas, who are walking down a trail that hadn't been visible from the entrance to the valley, but is now obvious. I quickly dart up the trail to join them, a huff of laughter escaping me as I realize that they're arguing again, this time about the merits of using hellhounds, both of them arguing for different reasons.

"It's because they don't mind any other races-"

"If the founders had wanted something that didn't mind different races, they would have just enchanted something-"

"-but enchantments can be broken, and tokens might wear away, especially since you know how long therm they were planning. With the hellhound pack, there will always be transportation that won't mind any of the races they'll have to carry, even the cats-"

"-yes, but who's to say that the cats don't mind the hellhounds, they are basically over sized dogs after all."

"The dogs mean no harm, and if anything, the cats should be worried about us werewolves."

"Yes, because we haven't figure out how to control ourselves, as if. The werecats are more dangerous than us, loathe as I am to admit it because of their size, they can easily sneak into houses and bite people. It's a bit harder for us-"

"Not all were cats are that small, you know. The weretigers and werelions certainly aren't."

"Don't talk to me about the were lions. I'm just incredibly glad that they don't" mumble mumble "In the same way as real lions."

I listen in amusement, undoing the braid I had my hair in, brushing it, and rebraiding it. as they get entirely off track as we follow the trail. There's a fork after a couple of trees, but that's quickly solved when Ezekiel and Thomas check which way their tokens are pulling, their argument not even pausing. By the time we're at the end of the trail, they've somehow managed to get onto the subject of Europe, how they hate it, and how England is the worst of Europe.

I'm listening to them half with amusement, and half with slight despair as they moan over various things the European governments have done, and I have to stop myself from bumping into the when they suddenly stop.

"We're here," Ezekiel says, turning to look at me.

"Stick close," Thomas says, pulling me up so that I'm between the two of them. "The vampires will no doubt try to do something to you. If any of them so much as h

ints at hurting you, go up to a werewolf, any werewolf, or a wold spirit. They'll protect the child of an Alpha on principle. The werecats are a secondary option if there aren't any werewolves around, but be careful."

They turn back to the tree that the path ends at, and using one of the pieces of Bart that stick out as a handle, Ezekiel pulled a door open, revealing a large room carved inside of the tree with a soaring ceiling covered in luminescent moss, with round tables growing out of the floor scattered around. On the other side of the room, there are two people that looked like thay had been talking, but are now watching us.

"Thomas Rogers," the orange haired man says, amusement coloring his tone. "I thought you were staying away from here."

"Zion," Thomas nods as the two adults come closer. "Someone called me up, told me there was something interesting. They were right."

"Is that so?" the woman asks, her brown eyes sparking with amusement. "Well, I'm glad that you think so. Nice to have you back Thomas."

Then she turned to me. "Noah Reis. Nice to meet you. I hope we exceed your expectations."

"Thank you," I say carefully.

"Introductions aside, you three are the first ones here. Congratulations," Zion says, stopping in front of us, and I blink as I realize that his eyes are different looks. One is red, and the other one is green.

"Thank you for informing us," Ezekiel says, pushing me back slightly, his eyes fixed on Zion. "May we have our room keys now? We might as well choose the good ones while we're alone."

"Of course," the woman smiles, and holds three keys. "I trust you can show Mr. Reis here what to do?"

"Yes," Ezekiel says, letting the brown haired woman drop the keys into his hand. "See you three for dinner then."

With that, the two adults walk past us, pushing the door open as they continue their discussion. The tension that had one with their presence melts away, and Ezekiel relaxes, throwing a glance behind him at the closed doors.

"Who were they?" I ask as Ezekiel turns and hands me a key.

"The woman, Adela Svera, she's the Head of Benal. The man is Zion Chart, one of the Ancient Vampires, but he still hold himself in the service of one who is a couple centuries older than him. He's the foremost expert in Runes in the world among any species. He teaches Runes here."

"Wow," I say, glancing down at the key, and taking in it's utter ordinariness. "So what now?"

"Let's go find our rooms. First come first serve, the tops of the trees in this case," Ezekiel says, walking past me and opening the door. "Now that we've gotten here, the tokens will take us there."

Thomas and I follow him, our tokens in our hands, just taking in the huge trees. After a couple of trees, our tokens pull us in different directions, and I look at Thomas and Ezekiel, who just go up to opposite trees before I go up to the tree.

"Now put your hand on the tree, it'll open and show something like lobby," Ezekiel calls out. "Across from you, there'll be a set of doors, put your hand on those too. They'll open. When you're in, put your key into the lock beside the door. It'll take you to your room."

"Alright, how do I get out?" I ask, placing my hand on the tree in front of me, and watching as a door slid open.

"The room you use to get to your room works like an elevator. Get into it, then out a couple seconds later, and you'll be in the lobby," Ezekiel says, his voice faint, and I take a deep breath before stepping into the tree. I look around me, at the library on the right, the piles of cushions, the couches, chairs, tables, and the little pantry on the left, all lit from above by luminescent moss, with little patches off moss growing next to each of the chairs and cushions. Like Ezekiel had said, there was a set of doors across from me, and I stride across the room to them.

I open the door and step into the room, turning as the doors close. I put the key Ezekiel had given me into the lock next to the door, and it opens after a moment, revealing a room carved of a warm wood. I step out of the elevator and onto the dark red wood floor, looking across the room, taking in the oranges and dark blues decorating the room.

It's perfect. There's a big window across from me, looking out onto the rest of the valley, facing two other sequoia.

To the right is a plush bed with a navy blue bed cover embroidered with the night sky set into the wall, a couple of rows of books along the same wall. To the left is a little kitchen, arranged in a different way than Aunt Petunia's kitchen with navy blue counters and walls, speckled with bits of orange, and a staircase along the wall next to it, leading to a second story above my head. Under the staircase is a fire place, with a fire burning in it, and some plush chairs, as well as a table.

The middle is clear, and has a rug with the stars on it. I walk out to the center and turn so I can see what's on the balcony, and blink at the assortment of ropes, chains, bones, chunks of clay, feathers, plants, and random chunks of rocks.

There isn't a ceiling, instead the wooden walls extend upwards until they're lost in shadows, and though every thing is lit by the window, I can see patches of moss strewn all over. There's a knock on my door and I walk over to it to open it.

"You got a good room, " Ezekiel says, looking round himself as he comes in, Thomas walking behind him.

"Thank you. Why is it already decorated?" I ask, watching as Ezekiel walks out into the room and spins.

"It reads your mind partly, and parts of your room," here Thomas glances up at the balcony, "are there because it predicts what you will be good at, and provides supplies. You'll most likely need most of the stuff up there at some point."

"What do your rooms look like?"

"Come and see for yourself," Ezekiel invites.

* * *

><p><em>Hours later . . .<em>

I laugh as I run into the hall the token had led me to first.

"You know I'm right!" I yell behind me, ignoring the attention that I'm attracting.

"You are not right!" Ezekiel yells as he runs in behind me, trying to tackle me. "Purple is not a girly color! Especially not dark purple! It's the color of royalty!"

"Yeah, and who dreams of being royalty? The girls!" I laugh, avoiding his jump. "The boys want to be knights! Not wimpy princes!"

"You know, I'm usually the one who fights with Ezekiel like this," I hear Thomas remark as he shuts the door behind himself. "It's kind of nice. Silencio!"

I turn to growl at Thomas, but like Ezekiel beside me, no sound comes out of my mouth.

"Uh-hu," Thomas says, looking unimpressed at the both of us before he starts dragging us over to a table with some people at it. I blink then wave when I realise that it's the same people we had sat down with back at Saraswati's Hostel.

"These are the werewolves and wolf spirits in our year," Thomas introduces. "Everyone, this is Noah Reis. He'll be running with us for a while becuase an unknown natural Alpha marked him. You ready to behave now?"

I tilt me head for a moment before I nod. A quick Finite later I'm speaking with the rest of the people at our table.

* * *

><p><em>Hope you like this chapter!<em>


	8. Chapter 8

After dinner (ordered by menu then appearing on our plates like it does at Hogwarts), I stand and stretch. Someone taps my shoulder, and I turn to find an red haired (and I mean red like fire) standing behind me, looking almost startled. His eyes - they're a thousand different colors competing and battling for the same space, gold and silver folded together a thousand times, a flickering fire about to go out, a raging inferno the cannot be stopped, the grey of ashes, the glow of lava -

"Yes?" I ask as Ezekiel stands and moves closer to me. The boy opens him mouth for a moment before closing it with a frown. He makes and odd motion with his hand that ends with his fingers in line with his nose and pointing upwards, the sign for requesting permission to create a superficial mind ink so he can speak with me.

"Why are you here, bi-" Ezekiel starts, but the boy make a sharp slashing motion, cutting off Ezekiel's words. Ezekiel looks between me and the boy before me shakes his head. "So it's like that is it?"

I look between Ezekiel and the boy for a moment as Ezekiel stares intently at the boy before shrugging. "Whatever. Have fun you two."

I watch Ezekiel turn and head for the door before I nod. "I'll speak with you."

I reach out and let the slight link form between out minds, and word come to me.

_"Hello, I'm Brandr,"_ the red haired boy says with a smile. _"I . . . um, I was wondering if I could be your friend."_

_"My friend?"_ I ask, my mind turning immediately to Ron and Hermione, who I had left behind. _"Why? You don't know me. We've only just me."_

_"I - my species can sense a person's character,"_ Brandr explains nervously. _"I - you're really bright. Um, that means that you're a good person, and you have the same shade that most of my friends have."_

_"Oh,"_ I state, turning that thought over in my mind. _"Well, I guess so. I'm not really sure what friends are supposed to be, but I can try. I'm Noah. Noah Reis."_

_"Thank you,"_ Brandr says with a smile, before he hesitates for a moment. _"May I sit with you tomorrow?"_

_"Sure,"_ I reply, feeling slightly awkward. _"I should probably go now though."_

_"Of course,"_ Brandr nods and steps out of my way. "See you tomorrow."

"Yes, see you tomorrow," I reply, sending a glance at Thomas who's still sitting at the table before I turn and exit the dinning room.

* * *

><p>The next morning I sit down at the table next to Thomas, who's eating cereal as he reads a book, and order the toast and jam option off of my menu, and start eating.<p>

"Phoenixes can turn human if they love someone," Thomas comments without looking up from his book. "It hasn't happened in about a thousand years because that's so rare. You won't see an phoenix in human form otherwise though. Something about their magic."

"And what is that delightful tidbit about?" I ask after swallowing a mouthful of toast, and Thomas looks up from his book, his amber eyes sharp before he glances back down again.

"Nothing," he says, stick another spoon with Cheerios into his mouth. "Just something you should know."

"Lovely," I comment and take another bite of my toast. A moment later, Brandr drops into the seat to my left and smiles at me, one again making the sign to request a link. I wave a dismissive hand and mentally reach out.

_"How was your sleep?"_ Brandr asks me as he looks over the menu for a moment before ordering what appears to be a bowl of sunflower seeds and almonds, with a glass of water.

"Fine," I reply aloud, raising a hand to wave at Tamara, one of the werewolves Ezekiel had introduced to me last night, as she sat down a table away. "How was yours?"

_"It was adequate,"_ Brandr replied, and for a moment, there's awkward silence before Ezekiel wanders up to the tale with his eyes closed, and blindly points to something on the menu. The bowl of sugar cubes appears before him, and he pops one into his mouth, his eyes closed the whole time.

"Good night's sleep?" Thomas asks without looking up.

"Oh Fenris yes," Ezekiel mutters, his eyes finally opening. "Sleep is heavenly. Bless Hypnos and Morpheus."

Brandr and exchange glances and laugh silently for a moment.

_"What classes are you planning on taking?"_ I ask as I take another bite of my toast. _"I'm planning on Wandless Transfiguration, Spell Smithing, Runes, and Faeri magic, as well as the mandatory classes."_

_"Shamanism, Healing, Potions, and Illusions,"_ Brandr says. _"Why is it you want to learn Transfiguration and Faeri magic? Those are some of the easier magics, and are usually learned by this time?"_

_"Because my parents dies, I was sent to live with mundanes,"_ I explain a little bitterly, as I finish off my toast. _"I only found out that I was a wizard two years ago."_

_"And yet you still managed to get into here,"_ Brandr says in a quiet voice. _"I know many who have been learning magic all their lives who failed to get in."_

_"I got lucky, Ezekiel took interest in me,"_ I say, opening my menu and looking for a good drink. _"So, why healing and potions?"_

_"Healing is . . . a natural attribute of my race,"_ Brandr admits after a moment, finishing the last of the seeds in his bowl. _"And as for potions, they are very versatile. While magic can be used to do many things, potions work in different ways, they fold magic in more complex patterns than we often have time for, and many can be stored for years."_

"So," Ezekiel clears his throat, and I look up just in time to see him open his sharp amber eyes. "What's the peacock's name?"

"Him?" I ask, pointing to Brandr. Ezekiel nods. "He's Brandr."

"Brandr, huh?" Ezekiel asks before he makes the link request sign. Brandr shoots me a glance before he sighs.

_"I think he wants this to be a private conversation,"_ he notes, and I can feel the link start to dissolve. _"Talk to you later?"_

"Of course," I reply, and Brandr simply smiles at me before turning to Ezekiel. I watch them stare at each other intensely for a moment before I turn to Thomas on my right. "So what are you reading?"

"Finally, you ask," Thomas says sarcastically as he lifts his book and turns it so I can see the cover as he keeps reading.

"It's a book catalog," I state after a moment. "For fictional books."

"Yeah," Thomas says, lowering it back to the table. "It was the only book I brought with me, so I'm reading it while I wait for someone to ship me all of my other books. I've found a few things worth ordering so far, but most of this is newer ideas that while original, twist any supposed traits said to be held by a race out of proportion."

I glance at the epic glaring match going on between Brandr and Ezekiel before I turn back to look at Thomas, and catch him looking at them too. He immediately glances down when he catches my eye, but I don't miss the frown.

"Here, I forgot to give you this earlier," Thomas says, thrusting an envelope that had been serving as his bookmark at me. "They think they're getting closer. They haven't cleared Europe in a while so they're finding a lot of werewolves that aren't in strong packs, but not any natural Alphas yet. But there have been rumors of a man who had been living utterly alone for the past twelve years, and there are several packs that have tried to get him to take over."

"Remus Lupin," I mutter, reading the letter. "Known to be friends with Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, and James Potter."

"James Potter is the only one known to have had children," Thomas says after a moment. "Harry James Potter, supposed Savior of the Wizarding World, and Boy-Who-Lived."

"I know," I say lightly around the lump in my throat. "I did live in England after all."

Thomas take back the letter after a moment, and watches me."You knew we were going to find out. There aren't that many natural alphas."

"I knew," I say, closing my eyes. "So, anything else? Other than Black trying to kill the boy Hero of course."

"Well, they've found that the Headmaster of Hogwarts went looking for him over the summer, apparently hoping for help in finding their missing 'savior', but no one's seen him in a week or so."

"Alright," I nod, and push my feelings aside for a moment. "So, what classes are you planning on taking?"

"Token magic, Languages, Runes, and Old Magic," Thomas says, pushing an errant strand of brown hair back from his eyes. Then he turns annoyed eyes to Ezekiel and Brandr, who were still in their intense staring contest. "Are you two done yet? Because I'm done distracting him from wondering what you two are fighting about when you literally just met."

"But-" Ezekiel says, breaking away to look pleadingly at Thomas.

"No. He's made his intentions clear. Noah will be fine," Thomas states flatly. "Now eat an actual breakfast."

"But Thomas! Sugar is a balanced breakfast!" Ezekiel protests. "My bowl of sugar is as heave as a gold nugget!"

"Not that kind of balanced," Thomas growls at him, and quick grabs his menu and taps on one of the options. A plate of hash browns, sausage, and fruit appear before Ezekiel, a glass of milk following a moment later. "This kind of balanced!"

"But Thomas," Ezekiel whined. "I hate sausage. And all of that stuff is for lunch, not breakfast."

"Eat," Thomas commands, raising his voice so that I the tables near us can hear, picking up his catalog. "Unless you want to go and spar for the rest of the day on an empty stomach. I'm sure your mother would love to hear that you aren't following her instructions."

I laugh, and Ezekiel throws me a glare as he sullenly picks up the hash brown. I can hear people at the table around us laugh as he bites into it with a grumble. "Traitor."

I spend the rest of that day, and the day after getting to know others better. Tamara, Shane, and Myf, the other wolf type creatures in our year are nice, but in the long run I prefer Thomas, Ezekiel and Brandr. I notice the way Ezekiel is awkward around the other wolves, even though he claims to have been friends with them for the past two years, and I can tell that Thomas sees it from the way he looks between Ezekiel and the other wolves. When ever we drift apart into separate groups, he immediately says something that makes Ezekiel snap back with a witty comment, and I know I''m not imagining the way his shoulders relax as he does so.

It takes me only a moment of watching them to realize that I haven't seen them apart once since Ezekiel called Thomas, and as I watch them bicker like a married couple, I wonder what it was that made Thomas decide to separate from Ezekiel and not come to Tiger with him.

Brandr . . . is odd, and that's honestly the best way to describe him. I'm also pretty sure that everyone around me knows something that I don't because when they come up to us for the first time, and start to say something, Brandr cuts them off with the sharp gesture. They all glance between the two of us, break out laughing, then start talking on an entirely different track than what ever it was they were going to say when they first came up to us.

I occasionally manage to catch Brandr just watching me and smiling when I look up from doing something (mainly beating all of my opponents in chess. Turns out I learned something from Ron when we played it.), but before I can do anything, the person talking to me does something to catch my attention, and by the time I've replies and looked back, he isn't looking at me any more.

Then the day I had been waiting for comes,


	9. Chapter 9

I wake up in my bed with a sigh as I feel the magic shift slightly around me. Thomas had warned me about this at some point, and told my not to worry because it was just the connection point settling. Now that the test is over, magical transportation can reach the school. I sigh slightly and prop myself up on my elbows to stare across the room.

My expectations are fulfilled when moments later, Ada pops into my room, Thorin and Dobby moments behind her.

"Rafiki!" Ada exclaimed, throwing herself at me, and knocking my breath out of me as y elbows slide out from under me. There were two more thumps as Ada started babbling nonstop into my chest, Thorin and Dobby hugging my legs tightly.

"It was so boring," Ada finally concluded her summary on the state of things over the past five days while I was gone with a wail.

"Hey, hey. It's okay," I comfort her, patting her shoulder under the purple dress (the one I made) she was wearing. "You can come right up to my room next year."

"And how did you two fair?" I ask Thorin and Dobby as I sit up, Ada still clinging to my shirt. They exchange glances before shrugging.

"Coulds have been better," Dobby says. "No new messes to find."

"Coulds have been worse," Thorin adds. "We gots everything clean, and Dobby and Adas be leaning to fight."

"I'm glad," I say, taking in their clothing choices. Dobby is wearing the electric blue clothing set I'd made him, and Thorin is wearing a dark grey set of clothing I'd made for him after Ada badgered him into revealing his favorite color. "I think you'll have plenty of work to do here."

"Oh yes," Dobby says, and three three house elves all look around in complete unison. I stifle a laugh at their look of pleasure at the contents of the room, not doubt seeing many messes I don't. Ada lets go of my shirt and moves to stand between the other two house elves. "Much to do."

"So," I start, interrupting their blissed out looks at the idea of cleaning, and three sets of bright green eyes swing around to look at me. "Breakfast?"

"Oh," Ada says, slightly disappointed.

"Yes!" Thorin says brightly. He snaps his fingers and a breakfast tray appears over my lap as Ada's ears droop. She suddenly looks up as I start eating the buttered toast from the plate.

"Medical exam!" Ada announces cheerfully.

"Eating first Ada," Thorin says gently, as he stops Ada from advancing on me. I nod my thanks to him as I keep eating. Ada and Thorin keep watching, me, but Dobby,already bored hops off of my bed and starts going around the room, his nose practically touching the carpets as he snaps his fingers and mutters. Thorin's interest wanes too though, and soon enough he goes off to investigate the kitchen. I almost want to laugh at Ada's concentration, but I manage to suppress the urge. I glance at the time clock next to my bed as I finish off the tea and feel thankful that I'd warned Thomas that I probably wouldn't be having my breakfast with everyone today because of my elves.

The Ada pounces on me - clicking her fingers and scanning the results as the appear before her. The scars from the burning that had made me leave Hogwarts aren't truly that anymore, and all of the little scrapes or bruises I'd earned myself fighting my way to Benal are the worst that happened to me. Ada sits back once she's healed them, slightly disgruntled and slightly pleased by the lack of any serious injuries.

Thorin and Dobby wander back to watch as Ada soothes away the last of the slight burns from the dragon, and for a moment they just sit there and stare at me, stupid grins on their faces.

"Come on you three," I shake my head after a moment and stretch. "I need to change into the uniform and get down to the Meeting Tree. You should come with me and meet my friends."

"Friends?" Dobby asks, an undefinable tone in him voice, and I nod. He strikes a dramatic pose then (slightly ruined by his height) and declares, "Wes'll need to approve them first. If theys wanting to hurts you, well."

"No pieces to be found there will be," Thorin mutters, and I stare at the three of them for a moment as Ada nods enthusiastically, looking to be harboring serious thoughts of slaughter. A lump form in my throat and sniff, quickly trying to wipe away my tears.

"Rafiki? Is yous good?" Thorin asks as I try to wipe away my tears.

"Fine," I say, my voice muffled slughtly by my hands. "It's just . . . no one's ever said anything like that before about me."

"The more fools they," Ada murmurs as she hands me a handkerchief. "Yous be special."

"So, where be your uniform?" Dobby asks, and I point to the door in the wall next to the bed that's almost unnoticeable from anywhere else.

"It's the tunic with the dragon," I say as Dobby opens the door and stops to stare at the wide assortment of clothing in it. It takes him a moment to drag his eyes off of the clothing, but once he does, he spots the school uniform right away, and with a snap of his fingers my clothing is switched out. I stretch slightly, and yawn and Ada and Thorin scramble off of the bed and stand so they can inspect the uniform. Truth be told, it;s the first time I've actually worn the uniform, and I glance down at it curiously, taking in the clothing.

The tunic I'd mentioned earlier is black, reaching my mid-thighs and has an image of a silver dragon twisting around it. The slacks are slack as well, and reach my ankles. While not overly impressive at first glance, the dragon moved when I blinked, and I realize after a moment that the dragon is moving like the protraits at Hogwarts did.

"It be nice," Thorin says, and I look up to see Ada and Dobby nodding in agreement. My lips twist wryly as I reply.

"It's not like I chose it."

"Take the compliment Rafiki," Ada says in exasperation, shaking her head.

* * *

><p>I wander into the meeting hall with most of the crowd, and manage to exchange greetings with Brandr, Thomas, and Ezekiel despite clinging house elf enforced barricade. Much to my amusement, I note that almost everyone has some sort of creature clinging to them, including Thomas with what looks to be a baby tiger and an air of extreme long suffering, even as he gingerly feeds it from a bottle. Ezekiel beside him has a utterly pleased looking little humanoid that I think is a brownie, dressed in a set of brown clothes that match the hair peeking out from under its hood as it possessively grasped at Ezekiel's shirt. Brandr, looking bewildered, is sitting in the middle of a flock of phoenixes, who all coo softly at him as I sit down, shuffling their wings.<p>

Everyone is dressed in the school robes, which look tailor made to fit them, and after a few more people drift in, the doors to the Meeting Tree silently close.

"Welcome, to a new year," a woman calls from above our heads, and everyone tilts their heads back too look up. I bring my hand up to cover my neck, feeling slightly uncomfortable with allowing it to show so much, and out of the corner of my eye, I can see many others doing the same. Above us is Adela Svera, the woman we'd met in the meeting tree when we first got here, and a man I think might be Aaron Brooke, expert in raw magic, and the oldest vampire alive today, from the descriptions that Ezekiel has given me. "Now, let's see how many of you have read up on our school history. Who are we?"

"We are the sleeping dragon!" the school roars, tills, screams, mentally shouts, communicates, and I can almost feel the - the togetherness, the sense of moving as one entity despite our race, species, gender, personality, interests, and its nice. It's the school motto, one with a long history of being proven true, especially by what was supposed to be its counterpart. The headmaster turns and leaves, following the disinterested Aaron as papers appear before us with a personalized list of classes we can take.

I quickly select my choices and tap the list to let it know I'm done. I turn to look at the others, who were just as quick, so for a moment, there;s just awkward silence as we stare at each other. I'm hyper aware of my house elves, who are all still clinging to me as they look around. I glance at Brandr and give the link sign, to which he nods in agreement, Ezekiel and Thomas copying the gesture moments later.

_"So, who are your friends?"_ I ask Brandr, watching the phoenixes trill to each other. Behind Brandr, I can see people shooting looks at us.

_"They are my friends,"_ Brandr said, hastily scratching one's head when it butted his fingers like a cat. My house elves, who've been silent as they cling to me peer suspiciously at the flock of phoenixes. _"I knew them before I came here, and they wanted to see how I was doing."_

"Bird brain," Dobby mutters, staring up at Brandr with wide eyes, and Brandr pears down at him, his eyes widening.

_"Dobby?"_ I hear him ask, his mental voice faint because the words aren't directed at me. _"What are you doing here?"_

"So," Ezekiel says, looking bored. "I'm assuming you two know each other."

"Oh yes," Ada says shyly, peeking out from under my arm."Dobby is always speakings about Dobby's bird brain. I be Ada."

Thorin darts around behind my so he can peek out between Ada and me as Ezekiel and Thomas shake her hand.

"Nice to meet you," Thomas says politely. Then he lifted the baby tiger carefully onto the table. "This is Vepkhia, a tiger. I found her about a week ago when I was learning how to contact pure spirits with some of the werecats - the rusty spotted ones - and while I was trying to reach the Siberian tiger spirit to try to start on my advanced animagus, it came up to me and plopped her into my lap."

His bewilderment was evident, and I was torn between laughing and staring for a moment before opting to do the former. Ezekiel on the other hand looks shocked, and almost . . . hurt?

"A pure spirit came up to you and told you to take car of one of her children?" I snort, tearing my gaze away from Ezekiel and back to the cub.

_"What?"_ Brandr asks, returning to the conversation as Dobbyy skips back to sit next to me with Ada. _"A pure spirit gave you their child?"_

"Yes," Thomas says, pride warring with his confusion now. "And I'm a wolf! I may not subscribe to the canine against feline nonsense, but I could have been all for it!"

His declaration is ruined when Vepkhia cries, and he immediately looks down and fusses over her.

"Oh yes," Ezekiel says sarcastically, his earlier hurt hidden. "The mighty wolf, killer of all cats young and old."

"Yes, well," Thomas sputters, trying to come up with a reply before his eyes alight upon the little person (brownie?) sitting in Ezekiel's lap. "You still haven't introduced Jeb!"

"Weak comeback," Ezekiel snorts, his gaze softening anyways as he looks back down at the creature in his lap. "Do you want to introduce yourself?"

"Yes," Jed replies, sitting a bit straighter and tugging at the hood covering his hair. "I'm Jeb, gentlemen, ladies. I'm a brownie."

"Ooo," Dobby says from beside me, standing to get a better look. "Domain?"

"Cleaning," Jeb says, his eyes sharpening as he shoots a challenging look across the table at Dobby.

"Cleaning," Dobby says with and air of indifference that doesn't affect the tension forming between them. I blink in bemusement when the two of them start tossing questions and answers back and forth, the tension increasing until I could almost swear I could see the air spark between them, and their noses were flat on the table. then suddenly and anticlimactically they both turned away simultaneously, crossed their arms, and declared, "He's alright."

I look between them for a moment, then glance around the now mostly empty Meeting Tree, and shake my head. "Good to know. Now, why don't you three introduce yourselves. You're the only ones who haven't yet."

"Oops," Dobby said, looking entirely unrepentant, even as he bowed with a flourish. "Dobby the free elf, a friend."

Ada stepped forward and curtseyed on the bench. "Ada the healer, a friend."

The Thorin, who had wandered out from behind my back stood blushing, and gave a deep bow. "Thorin, sirs. A friend."

_"Nice to meet you,"_ Brandr says, nodding his head to the three house elves, and one of the phoenixes gave a trill. _"They say the same."_

"Yes," Thomas speaks, gently stroking Vepkhia's back. "It's nice to meet you."


	10. Chapter 10

I can't stop myself from tossing and turning all night, and when I do finally get to sleep, that dream I've been having about red hair, and someone holding me comes. The quiet humming echoes in my ears as I wake up slowly.

* * *

><p>"Why am I in Shamanism and Healing?" I mutter as I receive my schedule. "What happened to my Wandless Transfiguration and Spell Smithing?"<p>

"You got Shamanism, Noah?" Thomas asks curiously, leaning over to look at my schedule.

"Yeah," I reply, letting him see it. "What did you get?"

"Spell Smithing, Languages, Runes, and Old Magic," he says absently, looking over my schedule. Vepkhia makes a sneezing noise, and Thomas quickly checks her before he turns back to look at his own schedule. "I didn't get my Token magic, but I honestly wasn't expecting to."

Brandr, who's sitting across from me and reading his schedule, looks up.

_"I got everything I asked for."_

"Shamanism, Healing, Potions, and Illusions, right?" I ask, looking at him curiously.

_"That's right. What about you, Ezekiel?"_

"Mm. I got Language, Martial Arts, Transfiguration, and Healing," Ezekiel says, poking at the scrambled eggs Thomas had put on his plate earlier. He's avoiding looking up, and sullenly lifting a bit of the eggs to is mouth occasionally.

"Are you alright?" Thomas asks, making him look up from the plate of mutilated eggs with a startled expression.

"I - yes," Ezekiel says tiredly, dropping his fork and pushing his bangs back with his right hand. "I'm fine."

"Is this about Vepkhia? Because I'm sorry -"

"It's nothing Thomas," Ezekiel interrupts, reaching out to grasp Thomas's shoulder. "Really."

He stands, and after a moment he turns and walks away from us, looking almost lost, for all that his stride was purposeful. Thomas looks down at the remaining food on his plate before pushing it away from himself as Jeb appears and grabs Ezekiel's plate.

"I'm going back to my room," he says as he stands and grabs his bag. "See you later, Noah, Brandr."

Brandr and I nod, and watch as he walks to the doors and slips out. I turn back to the table, and after a moment of staring blankly at the fruit left in my bowl, I grab the last couple of pieces and push the bowl away from me. Jeb, who had been staring at the door with a melancholy expression, turns at the sound of my bowl scraping the table, and starts gathering up the dishes again. I watch him for a moment before an idea occurs to me.

"Jeb, how long have you known Ezekiel and Thomas?"

"Oh, it must be thirteen years now for both of them," Jeb says absently as he pulls my bowl onto his dishes stack. "When they came to their families, I was just old enough to start cleaning, and so I was the one to take care of them most of the time."

"Could you tell me more about them?" I ask, and Brandr shifts uncomfortably as Jeb pauses and turns to look at me.

"That depends," Jeb says after a moment, fiddling with Ezekiel's clean spoon. "There are some things that only they can tell you."

"Why did Thomas decide to - Why didn't Ezekiel - Why didn't they both come to Tiger?"

"Ah," Jeb says, looking sad as he places the clean spoon in with the rest of the utensils. "That's one of the things I can't tell you."

"Alright," I say softly, and watch as he apparates himself and the dishes away.

* * *

><p>The door opens, and I step into Thomas's room, looking around at the majestic shades of green that decorate the room, still in awe despite this being my second time here.<p>

"Noah? That you?" Thomas's voice floats out from behind one of the many sheet hanging in the room.

"Yeah, it's me," I call as Thomas looks around a piece of pine green fabric. He sighs, running a hand through his short brown hair before he waves me over.

"Sorry about earlier," he says as I draw closer, and I round the swathe of fabric to see that he's sitting by a fire with Vepkhia curled up on his lap. "I just . . . couldn't stand being there any more."

"It's fine," I say, sitting on the green beanie bag across from his armchair as he absently pets Vepkhia. We both stare absently at the fire for a couple of minutes.

"Oh! I forgot!" Thomas says suddenly, making me startle, and he reaches the hand that isn't petting Vopkhia out to catch a letter flying towards him from the mantle above the fireplace.

"This came recently. It's about Remus Lupin, they found him."

"They did?" I ask, my throat suddenly dry.

"Yeah. Apparently he went to Hogwarts and got a job teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts. Knows absolutely nothing about werewolf society, and nothing a all about magicals outside of Europe."

"Typical European behavior," I say lightly. I glance up from the fire for a moment and catch Thomas's sympathetic look before I glance away.

"They're contacting him soon, so he'll know," Thomas says, before hesitating. "Do you have a way to look like Harry Potter again?"

"You're asking if I know how to turn myself back?" I snort. "Honestly the question is more if I'll look right if I turn myself back."

"Why?" Thomas asks curiously.

"You didn't think - well I suppose . . ."

"What is it?" Thomas asks curiously as I lean back into the beanie bag, my fingers resting in the groves left by the burns on my arm.

"Do you know why I left Europe, Thomas?"

"No one knows, I think," Thomas says softly, and I can imagine him shaking his head, though I can't see it because of my position. "All I've been able to get anyone to say is that you had an accident, and . . ."

. . .

"It was because of a Hufflepuff."

. . .

"That year, something had stared attacking the students, and by sheer madness, I was always discovered at the the scene. People got scared, and scared people are dangerous. So someone from my year found a fire spell and learned it - just for safety he said."

"Oh, no," Thomas mutters, and I can hear him shifting.

"I used to like to wander the castle, you know. Explore all of the hidden nooks and crannies, and one day I stumbled that Hufflepuff, just by coincidence. Only he didn't see it that way. You see, he was convinced that I was after him, and he used the fire spell on me."

"Oh no," Thomas says, but I continue on as if he hadn't spoken, my eyes closed against any tears.

"He used the fire spell, and it burned away - well, you can see some of what happened."

"Oh, Fenris," Thomas says and suddenly he's next to me and hugging me and I can't stop crying, gulping silently as the tears pour out.

Eventually the tears dry up though, and I'm staring up into the darkness of the tree, tear tracks running down my face. Thomas is just lying partly on the beanie bag, holding my hand from when I'd pushed him away earlier, unable to take the hug. Suddenly there's a wet cloth running over my face, and I blink at the red filling my vision.

"Brandr?" I ask, to exhausted to feel surprised as he nods, pulling back slightly. "How'd you get in here?"

"I let him in," Thomas says softly, and I turn slightly as he squeezes my hand.

"Alright," I say, my eyelid feeling heavy. "I think I'll sleep now."

"That's fine. Brandr's going to take you back to your room now," Thomas says, but I can't really concentrate around the struggle to keep my eyes open.

"Al'igh'," I murmur sleepily, my eyelids winning their fight and sliding closed. I vaguely feel someone pick me up before I fall into sleep, a warm melody following me.

* * *

><p>"Ezekiel, we have a problem. There is no way I'm letting Noah back into Europe, even if he wants to go, for at least a decade."<p>

"Why? What did he say?"

"You know those burn scars of his? Well, they're not just cosmetic. A Hufflepuff student from his year burned him."

"Fenris. Alright, I'll take care of things. How is he?"

"He cried himself out, and fell asleep. Brandr came, and I let him take Noah back to his room."

"Good. See you?"

". . . See you."

* * *

><p>"Rafiki!"<p>

"Mm," I groan into my pillow and yawn. "What is it Ada?"

"Time to get up!" Ada says, and I groan into my pillow again.

"Come on," Ada says, and with a snap I'm on top of my sheets and in the set of grey clothing I'd bought. "Up."

"I'm coming," I grumble, levering myself up and stumbling blindly across the room to collapse onto one of the chairs next to the fireplace. Someone puts their hand on my knee, and I open my eyes to see Thorin offering me a cup of tea.

"Thank you Thorin," I tell him softly as I take the cup from him, and he nods shyly before scampering away. I sigh and take a sip of it, letting the heat of it going down my throat wake me up. Thorin scampers back, this time with a plate of pancakes and strawberries, which I accept with a smile, and a nod of thanks.

I stare at the fire as I eat, and listen to the house elves bustle around trying to find any flecks of dust left, or apparating in and preserving various foods. When I'm done, Dobby takes away my dirty dishes, humming happily as he walks away.

"Rafiki," Ada says, and I turn to look at her. "Coulds we go to your other houses and clean them too?"

"I have other houses?" I ask, startled, and Ada nods. I blink, still surprised, but I nod. "Go ahead. I - could you bring me a list of what houses I have? And while you three are cleaning, could you take pictures?"

"Of course Rafiki!" Ada says happily, snapping and making a piece of paper appear. "Here's the list!"

Then she apparated away and left me to stare at the list. I glance at the clock on the mantle before I decide to wander downstairs and find Thomas, Ezekiel or Brandr. I glance over the list again as I step into the elevator and the doors close behind me. There are six different houses, which is more than I've ever dreamed of, and each of them are on a different continent. The first on the list, and the oldest, is in a place called Godric's Hollow. The notes next to the house's name describe it as a small cottage, and note that though part of it is destroyed, most of it is in pretty good condition due to the preserving spells from the wards.

There's one in North America, Lazy Dragons, and I recognize it as the one I'd been staying in for the past eight months. It's up by the sea in Northern California, with a small private cove, and small dragons sunning themselves on the rocks when the sun is shining. The paper notes that before my habitation, the house hadn't been used for at least a century.

In South America, there's one down in Chile on one of the little islands around Cape Horn called Witches Moon. It's protected by a large variety of wards, but hasn't been used for at least a century as well.

In Africa, there's a small cottage in the Sahara Desert, used by various tribes that live there. It's made to withstand sandstorms, and is also protected by a large variety of wards, those these are slightly different as they allow the tribes to enter. It's called Lleh Ydnas apparently.

In Australia, there's a small house at the edge of the Karlamilyi National Park, which has been unused for at least a century, like Witches Moon, and is called Polvale.

And in Siberia, there's what amounts to a fortress, somewhere. It's called Acingle, and also hasn't been used in a century.

I look up from the paper as I exit the lobby, and decide to make for the Meeting Tree.


	11. Chapter 11

"Noah!" someone calls, making me turn. Ezekiel's hurrying down the path towards the Meeting Tree. "Wait up!"

"Hi," I say as he draws even with me and slows down to match my pace as I start walking.

"I'm sorry," he says as we walk towards the Meeting Tree. "For yesterday."

"What about it?" I ask. "You weren't feeling good, so you left."

We turn slightly off the path, and I catch Ezekiel flashing me a disbelieving glance, his dark braid swaying as he shakes his head. "What?"

"You!" he exclaims. "You don't take offense at anything - almost anything."

"Almost anything?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.

"Um," Ezekiel says, blushing slightly, and I smile as I turn back to looking at the trees around us. "Thomas told me last night. About your- um, the Hufflepuff."

"That's what I thought," I murmur, my fingers digging into my arm. I could have removed the scars but-

"Hey, don't worry," Ezekiel says, and I turn to him, slightly startled. "I have quite literally seen slime monsters marry vela."

My mouth twitches into a smile as I turn to look before I nod at him. "Thanks."

"Like I said, I'm sorry," Ezekiel repeats.

"I did hear you the first time," I say wryly as I turn so we're heading back towards the Meeting Tree again. "Come on, let's meet Brandr and Thomas before we have to get to classes."

* * *

><p>"Brandr?" I ask, and the red head turns, his face lighting up as he sees me.<p>

_"Noah!"_ he says happily, but my attention isn't on the connection, but rather on Brandr's appearance.

"Brandr, why do you look like a girl?" I ask hesitantly, and Brandr looks down at the shirt pulling over a set of what are defiantly breasts before he shrugs.

_"I was renewed last night, and my body decided to change,"_ (s)he says. I blink, but before I can say anything Ezekiel laughs.

"What?" I asks, following his gaze to find his eyes fixed on Brandr - his- erm, her breasts.

"Nothing," Ezekiel says, a smile pulling at his lips. "Nothing at all."

"Is this regular?" I ask Brandr, and (s)he nods with a smile.

"Come on, you should sit down," Thomas calls. I automatically look around for Vepkhia as I pull out a chair to sit down on. "So, Brandr, Noah, how do you think you'll do in the animagus class?"

"I've found my minor animagus, so I won't be behind in that respect," I say, leaning back in my chair.

_"My current for is a sort of minor animagus, so I am ready for trying to obtain my intermediate animagus form,"_ Brandr says simply, fiddling with a lock of her hair. _"Aura reading is a natural attribute of my race, so I am not required to take that class."_

"Really?" I asks. "What are you then, if I might ask?"

_"You may ask, but I cannot answer,"_ Brandr says, throwing me a smirk. _"And yes, I am naturally an aura reader, do you not remember how I introduced myself?"_

"Ah yes, you came up to me out of nowhere and asked to be my friend?" I tease, making her blush.

"Wait, you really just came up to him?" Ezekiel asks incredulously, as snorts in amusement when Brandr nods, ducking her head. "You realize that that sounds like preschool right?"

_"Yes, I am quite aware,"_ Brandr replies. There's a whisper of something else along the link, but it's clear that the thought isn't meant for me, so I ignore it as Ezekiel shakes his head in amusement.

"Are you going to take another class in the place of your Aura reading class?" Thomas asks before we can continue on that track, and Brandr gives him a smile before she replies.

_"No, I have something else I'm planning on doing with my extra time,"_ she says, ignoring Ezekiel as he mouths something at her. Before we can say anything though, the sound of twinkling bells fills the air, making us look up.

"Come on," Ezekiel says, pushing his chair back and standing. "Time for classes. First up is D&D, they put everyone in a year in one class."

* * *

><p>I exit the class, and pick my way through the tree roots thoughtfully as I head to my next class, Thomas moving silently beside me.<p>

Professor Rory's class had been interesting, to say the least. He'd seemed absent minded right up until he'd pointed out several flaws in the disguises he had us put together in thirty minutes.

It took me less than thirty seconds to pull together a disguise from what I remembered of the Disguise book Ada had given me back in February, and by the time Rory had finished writing the instructions on the board, I had the physical aspect down, and spent the thirty minutes he'd given us coming up with a backstory to match. The teacher's eyes had lingered on me, huddled in a set of threadbare and hole-filled clothes, looking around myself in awe.

I'd smoothed the scars back into untouched skin, then brought up the multitude of scars that a street kid would get. I'd also darkened and shortened my hair, and darkened my eyes so I looked like nothing more than a street kid. It took me even less time to pull the disguise apart, the alterations shimmering and breaking as I waved my wand slightly to undo the charm that had altered them.

I blink and bring myself back to the present with a shake as Thomas and I stop outside of another set of doors.

"You good to go?" Thomas asks, and I nod. Ezekiel, having finished his requisite year of Aura reading when he'd entered, had decided to not take another class to fill the spot. Brandr, with her species exemption was also dismissed from this class, and had stayed behind in Disguise and Deception to ask Professor Rory something.

Thomas pushes the doors open, and we walk into the classroom.

* * *

><p>On the other side of the world, a werewolf paces restlessly in his chambers, looking at the letter sitting open on his desk once in a while in disbelief.<p>

It wasn't like the packs hadn't tried to make contact with him before, he well remembered his father reading letters with the same seal one them throughout his childhood, but they'd slowed to a stop, and after one letter sent directly to him after he'd graduated from Hogwarts, they hadn't contacted him again.

(In all honesty, if they's contacted him during any of the ten years before Harry had disappeared, he would have gone to them without a second thought, hoping someone could help, but it seemed they'd given up after he'd failed to answer their last letter.)

But that was only half the reason for his disbelief. If it had been a normal letter, asking him to join the pack, he would have sent a polite refusal once again, but instead they were claiming that they had found Harry, and insisting that they needed to speak with him, no matter what.

He wanted to send back a snarling reply, asking them why they were only contacting him now . . . but they said they knew where Harry was, and after Albus had finally admitted that he didn't know where harry was, Remus had clung to every hint of him he could find. He had been able to keep going, knowing that Harry was alive, and when the information about the petrification came out, he was able to hold himself back.

But when he'd found out that Harry had gone missing, he had stormed into Albus's office and demanded to speak with him. After a loud yelling session with the Headmaster, he'd gone to Minerva and asked for a job as a janitor, like Filch. A few stamped pieces of paperwork later, and he was home free with a salary, room, and board. He'd done his own investigations, quietly searching around the castle, and making friends with the students, but it was a week before he found out that Harry hadn't just disappeared, he'd done it after being burned by a Hufflepuff. There was another screaming session with Albus before he disappeared into the bowels of the castle, fuming as he cleaned secret hallways and discreetly got food from the elves.

He only noticed the start of summer by the lack of students talking and walking outside the secret passages, and it was a month before Minerva asked the elves to bring him to her the next time he came to them for food. She'd given his a long looking over with a raised brow, which made him look over himself self consciously, and quickly use a couple of cleaning spells to clean the grime of the secret passages off of himself. They'd talked, and she'd convinced him to at least check in with her once a week, so she'd know he hadn't fallen off a cliff or down a staircase of something. It wasn't until their meeting the week before school started that she'd expressed concerns about finding a new Defense professor, and to his surprise, he'd volunteered.

He shook his head and returned to the present throwing another glance a the letter sitting on his desk before he sat down and rubbed his face.

Then he pulled open his drawer and grabbed a sheet of paper and a pen.

_It's not like there was any way I would have decided differently_, he thought darkly as he penned a reply to the pack. He closed the envelope with a sigh, and after a moment of hesitation, he pulled out the only thing from the pack that his father had let him keep, and pressed it into the quickly cooling wax. He glanced over the seal once before he tucked it into his coat pocket and exited his room to head for the owlery. The seal pressed into the wax flashed once, and was still.

* * *

><p>I glance sideways as Thomas frowns, and starts patting his pockets, muttering to himself, before he pulls out a small medallion with something I can't see imprinted upon it, and quickly drops it onto his desk.<p>

"What's that?" I ask, moving the meditation instructions slightly to the side and leaning so that I can look closer at the medallion. It has a rudimentary picture of a wolf sketched in a few lines, and the runic symbols gebo, wunjo, and othala inscribed in repeating patterns around the edge.

"It's connected to the seal we sent to Remus Lupin," Thomas says, a smile spreading across his face. "It means that he used the seal that was sent to him when the pack first contacted him, and has at least partly acknowledged that he has some connection to us."

"Why do you have it?" I ask, looking up from the seal.

"I have no idea," Thomas says. "I can't believe that they let me even see it, normally the elders are the only ones allowed to see the seals."

"Early recruitment program?" I ask lightly, a laugh bubbling up my throat as I look Tomas up and down. "Or are you an elder? Maybe they've figured out how to make people younger finally?"

"Ha ha, very funny," Thomas says, pushing my shoulder. Then he looked down at the seal. "I have to send the elders a message."

"Go," I tell him with a smile. "Don't forget to tell the teacher why you're leaving."

"Pack politics," Thomas says as he stands. "Blerg. I left Benal to get out of that mess."

I look up, startled, but Thomas is gone before I can say anything. I look back down as the medallion before I slip it into my pocket. Then I look back down at the meditation instructions and sigh. Might as well get back to searching for aura sight.


	12. Chapter 12

After Aura Reading comes Fighting, and when I show up to the specified tree, I find myself herded into a group of people, and after asking around, it isn't hard to figure out that we're all of the students at Tiger with last names beginning with Q and on. The teacher comes pretty quickly, and soon has us in a neat formation. He explains that while this is fighting class, we first have to get into shape. I can see the older students grinning at each other from the corner of my eyes, and combined with the teacher's word, I have a sneaking suspicion that I know exactly what the teacher's going to say next.

"We're going to be doing laps," he announces with a gleeful glint to his eye. "Follow the red flags, first one to finish one lap doesn't have to do a second."

He looks at us expectantly as I thank the pure spirits for Oliver Wood and Thorin. "What are you waiting for?"

Immediately the crowd surges forward, and the oldest students take shameless advantage of their longer legs to sprint before the rest of us, and soon the crowd thins out as the slowest drop behind, and the fastest runners draw ahead.

I wasn't expecting to be first, not against the older kids, and especially not against the many other creatures I can see here that are most definitely stronger than a wizard, but I manage to make pretty good time, finishing the second lap just in time to cross the lap marker with the last of the runners on their first lap.

Lunch after that is blurry, the teacher forcing a bottle of water and a plate with bread slathered with cheese into my hand.

* * *

><p>Healing, after lunch, turns out to be not that bad. Ezekiel and Brandr are also in my class, but I don't manage to talk to them before the teacher stats talking. The first class taught is purely wand magic, and is about a few spells we can use before we learn the actual healing. We go into the theory behind the spells a bit, and practice them on various students who wander into our class room.<p>

Once we have the spells down, the teacher explains that while he will not be teaching us how to heal the way typical healers do, that's only because his way is better. All of the other schools of healing solely teach wand spells, charms, which requires you to memorize a charm for each specific condition, and know how to reverse each individual hex and curse. His way of teaching allows you heal something, even if you don't know what it is, but helping the body go back to the way it's supposed to be. He tells us that for certain things, there is only so much that this way of healing can do because the body does not know how it's supposed to be, especially in cases like genetic defects, but for practical purposes the way he teaches helps much more than the traditional way.

He also explains that he has heard of others solving genetic defects by using another person of the same species without the problem and teaching the body that the way it's supposed to be is like that, but it is not something he has experienced for himself.

* * *

><p>"What do any of you actually know about Runes?" the teacher asks, pacing in front of the class. Her sharp red eyes sweep over us, and no one dares to raise their hands and draw her attention to them. After a moment, she smiled, revealing teeth that couldn't quite be considered sharp. "Good. What ever you <em>do<em> know, and aren't saying because of me, forget it. It's most likely false, or at the very least misleading."

She turns and taps the white board behind her, an image suddenly appearing on it, one I recognize because I was idolized for it the past few years.

"Tell me, what does this symbol mean? Raise your hand now, don't be shy," she says, pausing slightly, and Myf, one of the wolf types people in our year that Ezekiel introduced me to, hesitantly raises her hand. "Yes! You!"

"That's a lightning bolt. It can stand for speed, light, fire, or electricity."

"Good," the teacher says, brushing a stray strand of her short hair behind her ear, and pointing at the boy sitting on my other side. "You."

"Um, it's Sowilo, meaning sun, from Elder Futhanrk," he says. "It is meant to sound like s."

"You!" The teacher points at me.

"It's associated with the only known instance of a wizard surviving the European Killing Curse, as a scar on the survivor," I say, and I can practically feel the others in the class turn to look at me. The teacher gives me a vaguely amused smile as she nods.

"Exactly. You!" The girl to my left looks embarrassed a the sudden attention.

"I-i-it's a symbol f-for a break," she stutters. "B-because of-of th-the jag-jaged-edness."

"And lastly you!" the teacher points at the girl in the corner, who looks up from doodling in her notebook.

"It's what ever you make of it," the girl says. "It can be lightning for speed, or sowilo, or a break, or the symbol of someone who survived something, or even a zigzag for madness or indecisiveness."

"Good," the teacher says, smiling. "That's exactly it. And that is why Runes is so hard. That is why I am telling you to forget what ever it is you have learned. All other schools of thought about runes hold that only their way is true, and that their symbols only mean one thing, but each of you thought of a separate meaning."

She pauses and looks around at us. "Your home work tonight is to make a symbol, and give it a meaning. Do what ever you want, love, hate, sleep, atoms, what ever. Just make it something you can draw in a few seconds."

* * *

><p>And finally comes Faeri Magic, a half-whimsical name for a branch of magic that is supposed to be solely for children. I find myself in a part of the forest that I haven't explored yet, a tree near the center which is larger than I thought possible for trees to grow. Of course this is Benal Raven, all carved from a single tree, with the tree still alive and ready to defend it's inhabitants.<p>

Back to Faeri Magic, it is exactly like the species it was named after. Whimsical seeming until you get too close. then is becomes dangerous and easily able to do great harm. The first lesson I get is how to light a candle by blowing on it. That passes quickly, and the second lesson I get is how to create a little ball of fire to see by.

I quickly pick that up, and the teacher shows me, and the other small kids who also finished it quickly that we can manipulate the shape of the flame and make different things. We watch in fascination as she shapes her ball into a small bird that flies around the room a few times before flying back to her and seemingly dissolving into a puddle in her hands. Then she formed it into words, and using a small branch, shows us how to burn images and letters into the wood. Then she smiles at us and shapes the flames into a thin circle, and proceeds to do cat's cradle with it.

Then she turns us loose to practice on our own.

* * *

><p>"Hey Noah," Ezekiel greets me, sitting down next to me. I look up from the small ball of fire I'm playing with a give him a slight nod before I turn back to the fire. An hour after learning it, I'm still trying to make it into a bird. "Do you know where Thomas is? He wasn't in Language. I didn't see him in Fighting, but I assumed that was because we were in alphabetical order."<p>

"He left during Aura Reading to contact the elders," I tell him as Brandr sits down next to me. "Remus Lupin's seal medallion activated."

_"How was your Runes class?"_ Brandr asks, tugging slightly on her shirt.

"It was really interesting," I reply enthusiastically. "I've already learned some about Runes, but this went more in depth, and it's just the first class."

"What do you mean seal medallion?" Ezekiel asks with a frown. "I'm pretty sure that only the elders are allowed to see those."

"Congratulations," I say sarcastically, dragging the medallion out of my pocket and dangling it before Ezekiel's disbelieving eyes. "What ever shall you do now, wise elder?"

"What?" Ezekiel yelps, grabbing for the medallion. I let him have it and turn back to Brandr, who looks amused at Ezekiel's incredulity.

"So, do you have much homework?" I ask, and she turns her attention back to me.

* * *

><p>Remus rubbed his face with a tired hand. He was slightly regretting his decision to send off the letter last night, but the wolf had been much calmer. It had never settle down after James, Peter, and - James and Peter had died, but it had gradually become less harmful. But for the past nine months, it had become much more restless again, pacing and throwing itself a the doors and windows trying to getoutgetoutgetout where'spup Ineedtofindpup. But tonight, while it had paced, most of its attention was focused on the windows, searching desperately for any owl sent in reply.<p>

Remus groaned slightly as he sat up and went to the door that the wolf had thrown itself against many times as it tries to get out, and it open with ease under his human hand, prompting a snarl of frustration from the wolf in the back of his mind.

"Remus Lupin," a voice suddenly called, and he jerked, looking frantically around the room, the darkness obscuring everything from view. He quickly pulled his clothes on, and pulled his wand out. He was about to relax and turn to the potions Pomfrey had let him when the voice spoke up again. "Remus Lupin."

"Who is it?" Remus asked, eyes moving from side to side.

"I'm Thomas Rodgers, from the packs," the voice spoke up again, and suddenly there was a flash of light as the candle flared into life. The wavering light revealed a young teen with short brown hair and amber eyes. "I'm here to escort you to the meeting."

"What about Harry?" Remus asked immediately. "How is he? Does he need any help?"

There was a pause before Thomas spoke as he stared at Remus, his eyes flat in the candle light and revealing nothing. "Harry is fine. He doesn't need any help right now, but he is part of the reason we need to talk to you."

"He's not in trouble is he?" Remus asked, swaying slightly as a shift of his weight reminded him of the injuries he'd gotten.

"He's fine, well and truly," Thomas said softly. "I swear to Fenris that I'm doing all I can to help him."

"Thank you," Remus said, casting a glance at the potions Pomfrey had left. "So how are you getting me to the meeting?"

"Like this," Thomas said, and Remus looked up to see the end of a wand -

Darkness.

* * *

><p>Thomas sighed as he left his wand slip back into it's protected pocket in his pants. It was the first time he'd needed it in weeks, and he shrugged off the guilt that came over him at using it to knock someone out. Lupin had avoided the rest of his species for years, it may be a bit later than most, but this was the standard ceremony.<p>

_Look at me,_ Thomas snorted to himself as he knelt and carefully picked up the tall werewolf. _I sound like a cultist or something._

He sighed as he stood and called out softly, "Jeb."

Jeb appeared in the silence that comes naturally to him, and looks Thomas up and down. "You need to sleep more."

"I know," Thomas sighed. "How was Vepkhia?"

"She was fine," Jeb repiles with a shadow of a smile. "She started missing you after an hour. I think she escaped."

"And that's good news?" Thomas asked, a smile on his face despite his disbelief."

"But of course," Jed replied. "It means that she's developing magic."

"Good," Thomas said. "Will you please take us to the Enclave?"

"Of course," Jeb sighed, holding out a hand which Thomas firmly clasped. The slight wind of air rushing to fill a vacuum blew out the candle on the desk.

Then there was darkness.


	13. Chapter 13

"Noah," Thomas greets me, sliding onto the bench next to me, dark circles under his eyes. Ezekiel looks up from his Transfiguration book for a moment to regard Thomas before he looks back down, and Brandr looks up. She frowns slightly and reaches out to touch his shoulder, a slight burst of magic clearing away some of his sleepiness.

"Thanks Brandr," he smiles at her, and she shakes her finger at him. "Yes, yes, I won't come to you for everything now, I get it."

She gives him a smile at this, and returns to her book, flicking a long strand of red hair behind her shoulder absently as Thomas turns to me.

"We contacted him," he starts, absently biting into a piece of toast that I force into his hand and swallowing. "He wants to see you - the sooner the better. Do you think you can come with me any time soon?"

"I can come after sixth period," I offer, and Thomas frowns, probably doing the time conversions in his head, and he nods after a moment.

"That should work," he says, sighing into the second slice of toast I put into his hand. "If you don't mind, how do you plan to change yourself back into Harry Potter?"

"I can't tell you," I say grinning as Ezekiel and Brandr look up. "Guess."

"Is this form an Animagus form?" Ezekiel asks, perking up, his attention leaving the book in front of him entirely.

"Nope," I say. "These are my real scars."

Brandr looks slightly startled at that, reaching out to put a hand on my arm. I flinch away before I can stop myself, and she hesitates for a moment before withdrawing her hand and offering her theory. _"Is 'Harry Potter' your minor Animagus?"_

I shake my head, trying to ignore her reaction to my flinch. "That's not it either."

"Are you reversing what ever spells you have that changed you?" Thomas guesses.

"No," I reply, my mirth gone as I watch Brandr return to reading her book. Thomas seems to catch my mood because he shakes his head.

"I'll get it, just you wait," he says lightly. I shake my head and tilt it back so that I'm looking up at the ceiling, absently contemplating the changes in my life recently. I frown and let my chin swing back down to look at Ezekiel, who's reading his book again, and Thomas, who'd taken a book of his own out of his bag.

"There was a full moon last night, wasn't there?" I ask, making the two werewolves look up.

"Yeah," Ezekiel shrugs. "It's not that big of a deal. Most just change and curl up with their pack."

"Thomas, you were with the elders last night weren't you?" I state, and Ezekiel looks up sharply.

Before the he can say anything though, the sound of twinkling bells fills the air, making us look up. I stand and shoulder my back pack with a quick shrug.

"Alright I'm off," I say. "Come on you three."

_"To animagus class we go,"_ Brandr mutters, pulling the strap of her satchel over her head.

* * *

><p>The class is . . . interesting to say the least. Like Disguise and Deception, we're lumped with everyone in our year, and because of the topic, there is a large amount of animals around under some spell so they can't hurt anything so that people can get an idea of what they want to become.<p>

There are also people wandering around with an animal, part or all of their body charmed to match. Ezekiel disappears somewhere as I look around, and I catch Thomas diving into the crowd after something, leaving me to stand awkwardly next to Brandr. Brandr is looking around with a half amused smile on her face, but her fingers are tight around my wrist.

"Come on!" she says after a moment as we look around. "I think I saw a Zhenniao over there!"

I laugh, but let her pull my through the crowd, ducking under long arms and jumping over low slinking beasts, calling apologies as we go. When we finally stop, I start laughing, the sound coming out oddly between my panting breaths. I smile at Brands before I look up at the bird we'd chased. It looks rather like a goose, but it's coloring - a red beak, purple and dark green fathers - show that it's not.

"Hello," I say quietly, reaching a hand out like I would to one of Mrs. Figg's cats. The bird regards my hand for a moment before it leans forward and nudges it. I blink t it, and glance sideways at Brandr who's watching it in fascination before it nudges my hand again, rubbing like Mrs. Figg's cats had when they wanted a scratch.

"She likes you," someone says, and I look up from the Zhenniao leaning into my scratches like a cat to see a woman with long black hair and tan skin smiling at me. She nods at the Zhenniao as she speaks again. "Most of the time, Jie refuses to have anything to do with people. This is the first time I've seen her willingly let someone touch her."

"Thank you," I say after a moment, slightly startled, and the woman nods before she turns to regard Brandr.

"And who was it that brought you here?" she asks her and Brandr gives a slightly shrug, her fingers tightening on my wrist slightly. It's obvious that they're talking from that way the woman's eyes flicker, but she gives away nothing as she slowly smiles. "Yes, of course."

Brandr nods decisively, in the way that probably would have been accompanied by a "Good." had she spoken out loud, and the woman turns to me.

"Noah, my name is Ayita, and I am of the Nunehi, a race much like fairies of your lands," she says. "It is nice to meet you."

"I am Noah Reis, of the English Wizard, a peoples I have found very stupid," I say after a moment, mirroring her introduction. "It's nice to meet you as well."

_"Good,"_ Brandr says, making me look back at her. _"Noah, Ayita is an old friend of mine. She'll help you if you need it."_

There's a moment where I process that before I sigh. "I don't know if I should be glad that you guys are introducing my to people you trust, or saddened by your lack of faith in my skills to handle myself."

"Glad that they're introducing you of course," Ayita says immediately, brushing as hand down her baggy blue jeans. I startle when suddenly there's a loud squawk, temporarily silencing the sound in our area as everyone looks at us before I hasten to return my attention to Jie. The Zhenniao makes happy chirping sound as I lightly run a hand down her neck.

The bell rings, and I look up with a frown. The hour had seemed far to short.

"Run along now you two," Ayita says with a smile. "I'll take care of Jie."

_"Thank you, Ayita,"_ Brandr says, nodding at her. Ayita smiles back and holds out her arms for a hug, which Brandr steps into.

"It was my pleasure," Ayita murmurs into her hair before she steps back. "Come, let me braid your hair some time."

_"I will,"_ Brandr replies, and we turn to go, Jie squawking slightly behind me before Ayita steps up to her. _"Come on, we've got Shamanism next."_

"I know," I say, a smile pulling at my lips.

* * *

><p>"Remus Lupin," a voice says, pulling him out of sleep with a start. His eyes flick open instantly and he immediately looks around for the. speaker, only to find himself surrounded by emotionless faces. "You have accepted the guidance of the Packs. Once again, we will ask you. Will you come to us with your problems? Will you follow our instructions as far as you can?"<p>

Remus blinked, still feeling slightly disorientated, but the words struck something deep inside him, as if he had been waiting to hear them his whole life.

"I will come to you with my problems. I will follow your instructions as far as I can," he said, the worlds coming from him almost without his knowledge of them.

"Then we accept you. May the moon give you peace, and and allow you no terror. What is ours is yours should you wish it."

The faces around him smiled, before many of the men and women got up and wandered away. Remus blinked again, looking around in confusion before a woman in what looked to be her thirties came up to him.

"Hello," she smiled at him. "It's nice to see you awake. You looked rather terrible when you first came in."

"Where am I?" Remus asked looking around as he straightened in his chair. "What just happened?"

"Hey," the woman said snapping chocolate brown fingers under is nose to bring his attention back to her. "Don't worry. You're at the Enclave, then Pack's home. What just happened is that you were accepted into the Pack community. You should expect some of the younger children to come to you soon and ask to join your pack now."

"Alri- my pack?" Remus said, turning to focus on the woman. "And who are you?"

"My name is Martha, Martha Smith," the woman said with a smile. "And as for your pack, that can wait for a moment. Let's get you dressed first."

"Dressed?" Remus asked, looking down at his clothes. "What's wrong with my clothes?"

"Well for one thing, they're shabby," Martha said with a grin, holding out a hand, which he took absently to help himself up. "And for another thing, they're way to delicate. Besides, you're not going to turn down free clothing are you?"

"Er - no," Remus muttered as he looked down at his clothes. Sure they were shabby, but he'd managed fine with them for a good ten years now.

"Good," Martha nodded decisively. "This way now."

* * *

><p>"So in recap, <em>I'm<em> supposed to be the leader of a pack now, and every one is hoping that _you're_ expected to become my wife, or at the very least my partner in all of this?" Remus asked incredulously, hands tugging absently on the sleeve hems of his new jacket. Apparently, while his old clothes had technically fit, sleeves were supposed to be at least an inch longer.

"Exactly," Martha nodded. She set the pile of clothes they'd gathered on a bed in the plain room. "I'm glad you finally accepted that you're a werewolf, it's much harder to run a pack along from what I've heard, and I wasn't looking forward to trying. Remus set down another pile of clothes on the bed as well before he sat himself down.

"Well," he said. "I didn't expect anything like this."

"Thought we were a bunch of fanatical people who reveled in being as uncivilized as possible?"

"Not exactly," Remus said. "But close."

'Well, considering that we very much are the wolves, we very much do need a pack," Martha replied. "It's also very nice. There's a support system to fall back upon if you need or want it, and a place to transform where you don't have to worry."

"I almost wish I came here earlier," Remus whispered, letting himself flop back to stare at the ceiling.

* * *

><p>Shamanism was interesting. It honestly seemed more like a religion than anything else, but with the added bonus of actually having the "deities" respond. The first lesson was one on how to contact the pure spirit, the embodiment of all a species was and occasionally all they could be, your own species. Other species are supposed to be much harder to contact, but after the meditation training from Aura Reading yesterday, I find that it isn't as hard for me to concentrate on the state of mind that the teacher describes. I don't quite get there, but I do go deep enough into my meditation that Brandr has to shake my to get me back to consciousness when the bell for the next class rings.<p>

After Shamanism comes Fighting again. We fall into the formation the teacher had specified on the first day when people notice the older student's positions, and the teacher gives us a momentary look over before he calls out that we're to do one lap following the same route we took yesterday before meeting him again for some exercises. When I finish the lap, I quickly drop to the ground net to one of the other kids to start on the exercises that the teacher shouts out. There's so many sit ups and push ups, and other activities that my head spins, but I manage to get them done in good time, and I eat my lunch watching those who hadn't finished yet.

Thomas sits down next to me about half way through lunch, giving me a brief grin.

"Hey," I say, and he smiles at me.

"Hey," he replies after hastily swallowing the food he had in his mouth. We stay silent for the rest of lunch, and split ways after, waving before we turn away.

Healing is nice again, though we don't get to try the way that the teacher described yesterday, instead practicing the spells on some of the Zombie students who had a free period. Their bodies are technically dead, so they can't heal on their own, but they will die again if they get too badly injured.

Runes comes next, and I show the teacher the symbol I'd drawn absently on a napkin at dinner. The rune itself is pretty simple, two 's's that intersect with a dot between the sides that almost touch. I'd been thinking of calling absence on account of my state of mind while I drew it, but I'd changed my mind last minute and named it acceptance instead. The teacher looks it over with her sharp red eyes, and gives me a smile when I tell her the meaning.

"That's a pretty powerful concept, Noah," she says, tracing a finger over the symbol sitting on the paper. "Good job."

After Runes is Faeri Magic again, and we learn how to create little animals to use as night lights, which can also be used as messengers, called patronuses. The animals are supposed to be based off of a happy memory, and lots of the children smile at that. Half an hour later, I'm sitting there, frowning at my hands as little silver animals the size of my palm fly around me, and the teacher comes over, a little unicorn galloping along behind her.

"Hey," she says, settling down next to me and flicking a strand of her brown hair over her shoulder. "You having trouble?"

"Yes," I grumble angrily. "I have happy memories, but when ever I try to use them, all I get is a little bit of silver mist."

"That's actually pretty good for someone your age who's trying this for the first time," the teacher says, making me look at her startled. She smiles at me and holds her hand out to her unicorn, who had been frolicking in mid air with a couple of the other patronuses. It comes to her at her call, and nuzzles her hand before settling down on the table in front of us. "The older someone is when they learn how to make a patronus, the harder it is for them. By the time some one's an adult, it's almost impossible to learn."

"Oh?" I ask, leaning forward to look at the little unicorn patronus, who lets out a silent whinny.

"Yes," the teacher says, and I catch her smile as I look up. "Maybe I should tell you more about it. That seems to help older children. Let's see. Well, the patronus is used, as you know, as a night light, and a messenger. In the Americas, many parents leave their patronus with their child every night. Other than being a night light, because of the patronus's basis in happy memories, they also act as a sort of dream catcher, only instead of trapping the bad dreams they encourage the good dreams. The form of your patronus is thought to be a representation of something that protects you, and is usually connected to your parents in some way, their Animagus form, or an animal that reminds you of them. While many people have just one patronus form, it isn't unheard of for someone to have multiple patronuses. A person's patronus can change over the course of their life. Does any on that help?"

I blink, going over the information she'd just told me, and a thought flashes through my mind. I hold my hand out and think of this summer. I think of Dobby and Ada and Thorin, and Ezekiel and Thomas and Brandr. And I think of Fawkes, beautiful Fawkes, who fought a basilisk with me, who somehow saved me, even though it's impossible to cure a basilisk's poison. And in a small corner of my mind, I think of the dreams I've been having of that boy, with red hair and tan skin who soothes my pain. I think of them, and I let my magic pool in my hand, a silver mist starting to form. Then suddenly the magic moves without my conscious decision, and the mist coalesces in my palm to form a small phoenix.

The phoenix tilts its head, then opens its beak to let out what I know would be a warbling trill before it flaps its wings and flies up to land on my shoulder, nuzzling my cheek.

"It's beautiful," my teacher says making me look up at her. There's a sort of awe in her voice as she watches the phoenix preen himself on my shoulder.

"Thank you," I say, giving her a smile. "The other information did help."

She nods absently, her eyes still fixed on the phoenix, who is most definitely Fawkes. I can see what she means about the patronuses encouraging good dreams, because I feel lighter now. Fawkes . . . Fawkes had protected me from the Basilisk, fought against it for and with me, then he'd cured me even though I was impossible. I may not have seen him in forever, but he's the first person to have really fought to protect me. The teachers had to protect me, but even so they didn't believe me when I told them that something dangerous was about to happen, and sent me away. Ron and Hermione were great, but it always seemed that they never got to the end with me.

I don't manage to complete the second half of the lesson today, not wanting to even think about sending Fawkes off, and the teacher smiles at me as I leave with Fawkes still on my shoulder.

I slide onto the bench of the table my group had claimed, and wait for Thomas. Brandr finds me first, and her eyes fixate of the silvery Fawkes on my shoulder.

_"Hello,"_ she says, her red braid swaying as she sits down across from me. "I see that you've found your patronus. Do you know who it represents?"

_"Yeah,"_ I reply in kind, watching as Fawkes flutters over to Brandr, and opens his mouth to make some sound before nuzzling her slightly. "_He's Fawkes. Fawkes was a phoenix who helped me fight off a basilisk last year."_

_"That's amazing,"_ Brandr says softly, lightly brushing a finger down Fawkes's spine. We both look up as Thomas comes up to the table, Ezekiel following him with a disgruntled look on his face.

"Alright Noah, are you ready?" Thomas asks, looking my up and down.

"I have to change first," I say, gesturing at my face and hair. "I can go looking like this."

"Right," Thomas says, looking around. "Can you do it here?"

"No," I reply, rolling my eyes. "Dobby! Take me up to my room please!"

There's a shark crack like a stick breaking before I appear in my room with Dobby giving me a hug. "Hello Rafiki!"

"Hi Dobby," I smile down at him. "I'm need to change forms now, so you might want to stand back."

"Oky doky!" Dobby says, scampering back a couple of feet. I smile at him before I let myself fall though the forms, and back into humanoid for before I can fall.

"Can I have a mirror Dobby?" I ask, and Dobby smiles at me, quickly turning only to pop back up with a body length mirror. I quickly check my face, but nothing has changed since the last time I slipped into this form, and I shiver slightly at the sight of the scar once again gracing my forehead. "Alright Dobby, I'm done."

"Is Rafiki okay," Dobby asks after snapping to vanish the mirror, and I manage to smile at him.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I say. "There's just something I have to be Harry Potter to do."

"And Rafiki doesn't like being Harry Potter," Dobby finishes my much repeated phrase. "Back to the others now?"

"Yeah," I say, tugging slightly on my shirt. "Back to the others."


	14. Chapter 14

I tug slightly on the bottom of my shirt as Thomas pulls me into a room off to the side of the Meeting Tree. Before us is a desk with the orange haired man I met in the Meeting Tree on the first day, Zion.

"Thomas," he calls as we approach him, as smile on his face. "Going home?"

"Yes Zion," Thomas says bluntly. "The door?"

"Right over there," Zion nods lazily. "This about that new alpha they found? The one neck deep in Wizarding Britain? It is, isn't it?"

"Ignore him," Thomas mutters, and I nod, letting him pull me to the door that had been indicated.

"So, you found Harry Potter then?" Zion asks as Thomas pulls the door open, and I glance back at him before Thomas pushes me into the room and closes the door behind me.

"Shut up, Zion," I can hear Thomas say from behind the door. "You may be over a thousand years old, but you are a vampire. You are not allowed to be involved in our internal affairs, so stop asking me."

"Thomas, you disappeared for two years. No one had any ideas where you were. Ezekiel was panicking, though he tried not to let you see it. Did you see the classes that he's taking?"

"I saw them," Thomas says.

"Well, why do you think he was taking those? You were _gone_, Thomas."

There's a pause.

"Leave Harry alone. He's been through a lot." The door opens and Thomas slides into the room, his brown hair covering his eyes. "Come on. Let's go."

"What is this?" I ask, turning to the doorway behind me.

"It's a gate," Thomas explains as we step up to it. It looks into a room looking much like the one we're in no, but something about it makes me uncomfortable. "It's a bit more comfortable than portkeys, apparation, or floo travel. This one's a permanent connection between Britain and Benal."

"Britain actually let you do that?" I ask. "Or did you just do it anyways."

"Well, it's not like Britain knows about it, so there's no laws against it," Thomas replies. "Now stop stalling."

"Alright, alright! Do I just . . . step through it?"

"Yes."

I cast Thomas another glance, but before he can say anything, I step through the doorway, feeling like I'm falling through space for a moment before my feet connect solidly with the ground on the other side as I stumble though. Thomas steps beside me confidently and starts walking through the door, leaving me following behind. He nods at the receptionist before going out a second set of doors.

"Where exactly are we?" I ask, Thomas as I tag behind him, looking around at the crowded square.

"We're at Woodland Node," Thomas says, pulling me aside st that a centaur can get through the crowd, then pulling me under a crowd of chatting faeries and around the pixies that were glaring up at them. "It's the center for all magic beings in England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. The wizards disagree of course, but those hat don't are welcomed here."

We reach the edge of the square and he pulls me past a couple of vendors selling perfumes and repellent for a variety of different creatures in tightly packaged bottles. I think I see a couple labeled "Muggle", "Wizard", and one that even says "Human". Then he pulls me sharply right into a shaded street with the name Gealach Street painted in Silver high above the crowd. The difference is obvious immediately because all of the people surrounding us looked like humans, and I noticed that they all had eyes in some shade of amber.

"So, how exactly did you change yourself back into Harry Potter?" Thomas asks as we weave through the crowds of werewolves. "Or will you not tell me still? And what happened to your scars?"

"I'll tell you after," I say, stepping to the side to let a couple of laughing children pass me by. "I don't have all of my scars because, had I not asked Ada to leave them, they would have healed away by now."

"I noticed," Thomas says, before he abruptly pulls me into a small door squished between two large window displays and into a room much larger than the entrance showed it could have been. We stop in front of the host. "Reservation for Remus Lupin?"

"The new alpha?" the man asks, blinking at Thomas in surprise.

"Yes," Thomas replies bluntly.

"He's here?"

". . . why would I ask after a reservation in his name otherwise?"

"Oh, of course," the host says, blushing and bending over to flick through the pages of the reservations book. "He's in the Forest Room."

"Thank you," Thomas says, turning in the direction indicated by the host and following the waiter indicated by the host. We go up a flight of stars and past several doors before the waiter stops before one carved out of a dark wood.

"This is the Forest Room. You can go in whenever you want," she says, bowing slightly before she leaves, her amber eyes catching the light for a moment.

"You alright?" Thomas asks, turning to me. I stare at the door, looking at the reflections on the polished door in the lamplight. "Do you want to leave?"

"I should go," I say absently.

"In or away?"

"In," I add, turning to look at him. "I'll be fine."

Thomas turns the handle, and after glancing at me again, gently pushes it open. The smell of pine trees, almost familiar now after my time at Saraswati's Hostel and my time at the school is the first thing to hit me. I blink at the swaying trees on the walls for a moment before my eyes focus on the two people standing in the room. After all the fuss that Thomas and Ezekiel had made, I almost expected to recognize Remus Lupin. Instead, there's just a vague sense of recognition that he's a werewolf from is amber eyes, and my eyes go instead to the African woman beside her. She reminds me of my Runes teacher with her (my my teacher's) no-nonsense attitude.

Then the man moves, turning from the walls in response to the woman's quiet murmur, and my eyes snap back to him as I examine him. His skin is pale, and his brown hair is flecked with grey strands that, combined with the scars and lines on his face, makes him seem older then the thirty years I know he is.

"Harry?" he whispers, and a sound I likely wouldn't have been able to catch normally whines on the edge of my hearing as he takes a step forward. I shiver, my hand coming up to press against the silver necklace under my shirt for the reassurance that this is truly my animagus form and not the one I had adopted as my own as I shift slightly to hide behind Thomas. The man's face crumples, but he doesn't move forward any more. Thomas glances back at me and sighs.

"Come on," he coaxes, pulling me forward and sitting down on the barkless log. I follow his example after a moment and watch the woman and man across from us do the same. We spend a couple of moments staring at each other before Lupin starts to speak.

"I'm . . . Remus Lupin, a werewolf - you knew that. Um, I knew your parents," he says awkwardly. I nod, still holding myself stiffly. Lupin looks between Thomas and I for a moment before he sighs and slumps forward slightly. "I'm sorry. I don't know what to say."

That startles a laugh out of me, and a smile at the realization that he doesn't know everything. "It's . . . fine. I don't really know either."

"Well, we could start with this; are you alright? I heard that you were burned rather badly," the woman by Lupin's side speaks up, adding her name after a moment. "I'm Martha Smith."

"Pleased to meet you," I nod at her. "And I'm fine. Everything healed up easily."

I hesitate for a moment before I pull up the loose sleeves of the green shirt was wearing, revealing scar free skin. Thomas shifts next to me, looking down at my arm.

"And how about you?" I ask before anyone can comment. I pull the sleeve of my shirt down and tug at the sleeve to make sure that it's settled around my wrist. "I . . . how have you been for the past eleven years?"

"I've been fine, I guess," Lupin replies with a smile. "I've had jobs on and off because of the full moon, but I didn't ever not have money. The last year before I heard you were missing, I found a good employer. I told him I had a disease that came back every twenty five days."

"That's nice."

"And what about that boy - Noah Reis? Professor McGonagall said he seemed to be good boy. Fawkes liked him."

The question throws me off balance, and I blink at them.

"Noah's doing fine," Thomas says before I can reply. "He's in some of my classes at school - and he's the reason I found you. He spent almost eight months with Harry, and it rubbed off slightly."

"That's good," Lupin says. "And you would be?"

"Thomas Rodgers," Thomas replies. "It's nice to meet you. Good to know there's more room now."

"Of course," Lupin replies, though he seems somewhat awkward.

"How is Fawkes?" I ask. "I only met him the once - but he was fantastic. And Noah said that Fawkes helped him."

"Well, we don't really know where Fawkes is," Lupin says, sitting back slightly. "He's highly intelligent and can take care of himself, but no one has seen him since the end of the school year."

"Oh," I frown. "Well, I hope he's alright. So, what have you been doing since you heard I was missing?"

"Well, I got a job as a caretaker," Lupin says. "Then I was going to be teaching the Defense at Hogartd this year, but now that I've become an Alpha, I no longer have the time to."

"And how are Hermione, Ron, and Hagrid?"

"They're all fine," Lupin replies. There's a sort of awkward silence as I stare at Lupin. I think that at this point, people would normally have begun to ask about other friends and discussed common interests, but I don't really know anything about this man. We spend the rest of the hour we have basically staring at each other and asking questions everyone in a while. At the end of the hour, a waiter opens the door and escorts all of us out of the room. We go our separate ways outside of the restaurant, Thomas starting off in the direction we'd come from and Martha pulling Remus the other way.

"Are you alright?" he asks me quietly as we weave through the crowds of werewolves. I glance down to see my hand trembling, and shake my head.

"I am not."

"At least you're admitting it," Thomas says, nudging me slightly as we exit Gealach Street and step into the courtyard. "So, will you tell me your secret now? How close was I this morning?"

" Brandr was the closest. My minor animagus form was a two part transformation - the auxiliary form being human. That's the form I'm wearing now," I explain.

"Doesn't that mean that she was right?" Thomas asks. "'Harry Potter' was your minor animagus."

"No," I reply as smile stealing over my face. "'Harry Potter' was originally my primary form. And since the form I am wearing now is an auxiliary part of my minor animagus form, it is not my minor animagus form."

"That is hair splitting," Thomas says as we go into the place we'd come out of. He shows two pieces of paper to the secretary without looking and we enter the door we'd come through. "How much theory did you even learn about the Animagus transformation anyways?"

"I was able to find and transform into both of the forms of my minor Animagus for on my first try," I say as we step up to the gate. I step through the gate, and manage not to stumble as much this time.

"Your first time?" Thomas asks before he steps through. "You are just full of surprises."


End file.
